ROCHESTER, Vt. -- Coffins lie exposed at the village cemetery, having popped out of the ground. Homes are reduced to what look like piles of giant matchsticks. A weathered brown house hangs precariously out over a creek, an enormous chunk of soil underneath chewed away by floodwaters.
The roads are covered with brown dirt left behind when the muddy water receded, and every passing car or truck kicks up a dust cloud like a stagecoach in a Hollywood Western.
The decking of a collapsed bridge protrudes from the White River, "R.I.P." spray-painted on the debris.
Three days after the remnants of Hurricane Irene deluged Vermont, this little town in the Green Mountains remained in the dark and unplugged Wednesday, its 1,000 residents leaning on each other -- and waiting. For food, for lights, for Internet connections, for telephones, for roads safe enough to drive in and out.
"It's like an island," said Penny Parrish, who owns the Skip Mart convenience store. "It's like one of those movies, 'Armageddon.'"
"The scary part was worrying about if we'd run out -- of food, fuel -- and then what?" said Amy Wildt. "The isolation is the hardest part."
The storm hit on Sunday, surprising Rochester as it did the rest of landlocked Vermont. No one was seriously hurt. But floodwaters washed out sections of Route 100 -- the main road through town -- and rolled through the cemetery, unearthing caskets. Houses and possessions were left buried under a shroud of dried mud. A house with a brick-red roof lay on its side, as if someone had leaned his shoulder against it and tipped it over.
"We underestimated the power of this storm," said Tim Crowley, a school principal whose 19th-century farmhouse on the edge of town was inundated.
It soon became clear that no one was going anywhere. The isolation bred frustration, but mostly cooperation.
Unable to refrigerate food, The Huntington House and The Cafe restaurants, the convenience store and a supermarket began giving it away.
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