When Hurricane Sandy hit New York City in 2012, I was living in a collectively-run bed and breakfast in downtown Brooklyn.
A multi-generational French family had come to stay with us that week, filling up all five of our rooms. They hadn’t been reading the news, and hadn’t seemed to notice the city battening its hatches, stockpiling water and food; they only learned about the approaching storm once it was time to stay inside.
We fed them soups and stews and kept checking in on them for the day and a half we were all locked down together, but when we asked one of the parents if he wanted jigsaw puzzles or games for the kids, who seemed to do nothing but morosely watch rain pelt the windows, the father told us there was no need.
“They’re French,” he explained, “they have inner resources.”
