Meltdowns and Waves – Archive

Blog Post #1: The House of Mary

I am many things, including a scientist, a bike wrench, and a catholic. I was particularly reminded of this last creed as I gazed into the wooden face of the Virgin Mary. Growing up catholic I am used to grandiose, imposing symbols like this, attending Sunday mass before a statue of our crucified lord. Seated around the kitchen counter the Virgin Mary was the second most powerful figure in the room, after the emotionally pleading yet formidable presence of a woman whom we will call Grandma Nazareth.

In order to elicit an impassioned response from this woman, all that was required was for us to look upon her with the same inquisitive interest that we had prepared to ask our questions with. I am many things, least of all an anthropologist, but I quickly learned that here I needed to be something else I’m not. A journalist. In the course of our conversation she lamented to us the fear she felt when she learned that three mile island was irradiating nuclear power into her community while she was charged with the welfare of children that were not her own. She describes the fear and confusion she felt when her young son vomited bright green after evacuating, describing it with certainty as “radiation sickness”, brought on by rolling around in the grass in the hours and days after the accident.

Though she pours out her fear, her dread to us in the wake of the nuclear accident we could not be mistaken for figures of authority as she towered over us preaching transparency, regulation, ignorance, and corruption those qualities possessed by the nuclear authorities in either too great or too little amounts. Gently we nudged the conversation towards the present day, and were quite surprised to find that she had drunk the kool-aid. She expressed sympathy for nuclear power, acknowledging its necessity and commending its operators for increased vigilance and honesty. Whatever happens, she says, there is no way they’re going to let anything more happen to this power plant.

Not far from Grandma Nazareth’s property you can in the distance the massive concrete cooling towers, spewing clouds of steam that seem to create the bright white clouds, threatening to pour down on this beautiful day. She hints at long term health effects, but even her anecdotal evidence provides no support for that. She admonishes the power plant for deceit, but acknowledges the symbol of a check they wrote for the trouble of evacuating her home. She still lives in the shadow of the reactor, but does not worry. She looks forward to retirement, she says as she placates thirsty three year olds with Dixie cups of ice water.