When we returned to our home in Troy, New York, after being evacuated during Tropical Storm Irene, everything on the first and second floors looked pristine, untouched. But just below us sat four feet of water. Everything we hadn’t moved out of the basement was submerged: tools, Christmas ornaments, water heater, furnace, washer, and dryer. A hard-shell guitar case floated near the stairs, bumping into the red Igloo cooler we take to drive-in movies. My canning jars were covered in silt; cardboard boxes had collapsed into sludgy islands. The whole place smelled like a nursery for black mold: damp, earthy, fetid, with a hint of ozone from the storm that left a metallic taste on the tongue. I could hear the water lapping up against the walls.
Troy floods. It has since before the Dutch arrived. I didn’t know this when I bought my house. I bought it because the chiming, rippling Poesten Kill canal runs through the backyard; because it has rusty old tin ceilings; and because I wanted to be a member of a vibrant, diverse urban neighborhood that comes together in summer evenings. The 19th-century brick building was a bit worse for wear. It had two stories, an extra lot next door for gardening, two off-street parking spots, some rot in the joists, and serious masonry damage. It cost $75,000.