After the flood - what 129mm of rain in 24hours taught us

We have only just, one year on, recovered from the May 2018 flooding of the Hobart Rivulet. We have newly restored floorboards and have thrown a lot away. The damp under the house is finally gone. We have no mould, which was a big concern, and held up post-flood recovery all over town. Our insurance is resolved finally, unlike so many other peoples. I’m not worried about rain in the rivulet any more, because I’ve seen a dangerous flood. If the water starts peaking in little standing waves in the street outside, then we know now that it’s pretty bad. And if the rivulet actually breaks the wall out the back, then that would be worse than last time and we might want to get out. We know now how to stop water flooding up from our bathroom floor downstairs, like it did. We know now that so many other people would be in harms way so much more seriously than us in a big flood, that we wouldn’t call emergency like we did. We also know that the hotel around the corner will take us in at 2am, and be gracious about it, and not rip us off, even if they are run off their feet in the disaster and we are soaked through and covered in mud. We know what it looks like 'after the apocalypse' because we walked through town at 2am that night. Everything was wet and muddy and wrong and broken and deserted and intensely quiet. We felt like refugees in our own city. But we had a great if very short sleep at the hotel, we left our stuff and booked in for another night, and then we went home to clean up. We had run out of towels the night before building a towel wall and mopping up. We know now that we need more towels. I think next time we would remember to put our gumboots on right away instead of bailing for two hours first. And we would get them out of the shed early before it fills with water and floods big time all over us when we open the door. Hopefully there will be no next time, or no bailing next time, or no damage at all. But we felt we got off pretty lightly. And if there is any bailing, my husband has proven that he can do three continuous hours of essentially weighted squats bailing water in his dressing gown without doing his back in. If we are flooded, we will be too stunned, like we were last time, to expect any political expressions of support afterwards from any one. There probably won't be any next time too. Overall, we are pretty good now.