Some memories about the immediate aftermath

Thursday and Friday are sort of a blur. I do know that neither night did I sleep very well. Wednesday I slept maybe an hour. There was just too much going on in my brain. We got to Showalter's place at about 10 o'clock. The neighbors came out and asked if there was anything they could do for us. We had picked up a little dog that was wandering around as we walked out, and I handed that dog to them, because I had too much to think about as it was. They took her, and have since contacted the owner and discovered that her 'daddy' died of a heart attack during the storm and her 'mommy' is in the hospital recovering from injuries from the storm, so it's a good thing we picked her up. She had an injury to her eye, that seems to have healed up pretty well already. They still have her, but will re-unite her with her owners when they are ready to have her.

We went inside at Showalter's, Wednesday night and attempted to figure out how to fit 12 people into a space usually occupied by 4. (as we drove near by to the place that was the 'official shelter' we debated, briefly, as to whether we should go there, since descending on Showalters with 8 of us seemed like alot to ask - but we decided that being at their house would help the little kids have peace of mind, since it is a place we go every Tuesday night for bible study - they are comfortable there, in familiar surroundings) What gracious hosts we have had!! They have provided us with a HOME in the midst of our chaotic life of the last week.

Lon ended up sleeping on a mattress out in the garage because our dog, Maggie, is with us here, and she barks and barks and barks if she is out there by herself. She can't be in the house because of Mike and Darlene's allergy/asthma situation. So someone had to sleep out there with her. After I got the little ones all bedded down, I went out and laid with him, and we 'decompressed' for a while (do NOT read anything into that - we were TALKING!) just processing, and finding out what had happened when/where, etc in our chaotic day. I ended up going back into the house and sleeping in the guest bed with Emma, the little bit of sleep I did get. I don't remember really, what I was thinking about, just replaying the day I guess. We already knew at that point that we had walked past a house with two dead people in it. And that they were still trying to get four people out of another house, as we left, that they could not get to, because of the flood waters in the drainage ditch. As I lay there thinking about how different the whole thing could have been for us, God kind of gave me a reality check. How much of a different place we would be in if we had had to leave a body behind in the house. I realized that the whole 'We are all alive and together' thing sounds SO trite, but it is SO HUGE. Oh - my - goodness!! I had been saying it from the very beginning - but that was the moment that it sank it's meaning into the very marrow of my bones. And the fact that we climbed up out of the storm shelter and found that Nan and Doug's house was GONE. I am SO grateful that we have developed a relationship with them, and had invited them to ALWAYS come join us in our shelter. It would have been devastating to find that they were lost. The only things we lost were just STUFF, and probably even stuff we don't even NEED anyway! When I called mom, immediately after we got hit - to let her know we were alive - I told her that we would likely only recover about 10-20% of our stuff. I think, in the end, it will be closer to the opposite being true. We have recovered 80-90% and lost 10-20%. The people are all alive, and, for the most part, even in pretty good spirits. I know there are other's out there who are not. Who have lost loved ones, and lost their stuff, and who don't have the faith, family, and friends that we have sustaining us so well, and I feel for them. I don't know what I would do in their situation. I guess I might ask that some of you out there in the blogosphere transfer some of your many prayers for us, to some of those hurting people around us.

But, I'm supposed to be recalling the time line. of events - I digress - sorry.

Thursday morning at about 6:45, I heard Darlene up and getting ready to go out. She had received a text message that there were grocery stores open in Athens (next town to the west) So, she and I got in her husband's car and headed out. It was not too bad getting there. We did drive through, what we found out later, was a part of 'our' tornado's path. It was pretty sobering to see. House after house after house, simply LEVELED! The only other thing to note about 'the trip' was that there were gas lines like CRAZY at every station we went by that had power back. That was the case for several days. Supply was not the problem, it was the electricity to pump the gas into people's cars. (we ended up having one of our church members go fill a bunch of gas cans for all of us - so we would not have to take the time to go wait in line - he called and wanted to know what he could do to help!)

Anyway - we got to the Athen's Walmart and discovered that it was not open. There were some ladies standing out in front, and I went to ask them what the story was. They said that without power, they were not opening up. I told them I was just hoping to get toothbrushes, underwear and socks for my kids. There was some 'going and getting of managers' etc. and eventually, I was escorted in, to find a few things I needed. The lady that took me in had to write down all the UPC codes of what they gave me and so that they could write off the donation, and so the whole process took about 45 minutes. It was hard not to want to just ask for some bread and bananas and shoes (which I did actually ask for) and ... and... because at that point I was under the understanding that we had pretty much lost EVERYTHING. But I was SO grateful for what she was giving me, I kept my mouth shut! I came out, about 45 minutes later, with two grocery bags full of 'essentials' that Walmart had given to us. They may be a big corporate company that I don't agree with some of the practices of what they do, but they do have employees who have a heart and were willing to reach out and do what they could in the situation. I got to the car and discovered that Darlene had set in the car and watched them turn away person after person after person after I went in. I was the only one who got in there that morning. "Ask, and ye shall receive".

We then went to Publix to get groceries and dog food. Just getting a cart was quite a feat. We ran into Bill and Anna, from church, Bill is the deacon that was at the church with Lon and him get to us, and helped us get out in his truck. He was so relieved to see us again, he nearly cried, right there in Publix.

We got groceries. Focusing our efforts on things that can be cooked on a camp stove and Bar-B-Que. I picked up some toiletries and dog food for Maggie. I also grabbed several pair of leather work gloves and contractor trash bags. Both proved to be VERY useful over the next few days. Darlene was impressed with how constrained people were being. She said in hurricane season in Miami - there are complete panicked 'runs' on the grocery store - with people buying ALL of a certain product - just sweeping the shelves clean - and then turning around and selling it at a profit, etc etc. This was complete restraint - people just getting what they needed. Very beautiful.

We got back to the house around 10, I think. The guys were sort of focusing on getting 'household' set up for all of us. Michael is the Pathfinder director, so they went to the church and recovered the cooking items from the camping gear there. They also, at some point, got the Pathfinder van for us to use as a vehicle, since our truck was still trapped in the garage. We heard, I believe on the radio, that no one was being allowed up into our area until the search and rescue efforts were completed. We had limited gasoline resources and we didn't want to drive up there, just to be turned away. So we waited. We spread things out on the lawn to dry and we ate breakfast, etc. (not much appetite!). Cell phone communications went down some time on Thursday - Lon speculated that the cell towers had used up their battery back-up resources - so there was no calling to check on people, so those who had gas, drove around checking on people. Several people from church came by, to check on Showalters, and discovered us there, and then came back with food for us all! At one point someone showed up who had been to our house to check on us! Apparently we could get up there! So at some point in the early afternoon we got in the van and headed up there. I don't remember which of the kids came along at that point - I know the three little kids did NOT go, I think only Annie and Sarah came, because Emma was not there when we found her chickens. Michael shot alot of video of that particular trip. I'll try to get some of it posted later.

We got out and sort of wandered around a bit, taking a few pictures, etc. Then, set about clearing the path to the front door, which was covered in debris. Even getting into the house, though, did not set us right to work recovering stuff. There was so much debris everywhere it was a chore just to clear paths so people could get around. We did find a couple of 'treasures' right away. I found my mother's recipe box almost immediately! That was a BIG one for me. I don't really remember specifically what else was found, but I know that each of the four of us found an item or two that we were hoping would be able to be recovered. We went downstairs to check on the pets we had left there. They were all fine. I had prepared Emma for the fact that, while we had found five of her chickens alive after the storm, they were pretty wet, bedraggled and traumatized and that they might not make it through the night. Annie and Sarah and I went down to check on them, in the closet where she had cloistered them, and not only were they alive, they had laid three eggs overnight!! That was just AMAZING to me!! The cat showed himself at some point while we were there Thursday. So that was good to know. He was having a hard time believing that we were not going to chase him out of the house every time we found him 'inside'! He would RUN whenever we startled him by finding him in this room or that room that he had never been allowed into! We checked in on various neighbors, and I dont' remember what else we did. We loaded up two loads of stuff, including the rabbit and guinea pigs. I guess into the van and the truck of another church member. There was a dusk-to-dawn cerfew, so we didn't stay REAL long, some of us left a bit earlier, so we could go check on a couple of other church members who live not too far from us. So we went separate directions when we left and from what Lon said, he would likely get to the house before us. We checked in on Dennis and on Nigel, both were fine. They lost just trees and limbs, no house damage. And we headed back to Showalter's place. When we got there, the guys were not there yet. They did not arrive for quite a while and I was getting pretty worried about them. But in the end, what they did was to go and secure a storage unit! They left a bunch of stuff there! I should have known they were doing something wonderful. That evening I don't remember what we did in the evening. Even eating, etc is such a challenge after dark. We probably went to bed early.

Friday morning our intention was to be at the house quite early but there were delays of one sort or another. Unfortunately, Lon is not here with me right now - he is at a sleep study tonight - so he is not able to fill in the places where my memory has holes. Maybe he can post something later and do that. I just know it was around 10 before we got over there on Friday. One of the first things Michael and Lon did was to go to the garage and climb in through the truck and uncover the generator and drag it back, through the truck, and up into the house to be taken to Showalter's place. They were SO proud of themselves - they came marching up into the living room shouting, "The VICTORIOUS Engineers have returned SUCCESSFUL from their all-important quest!!" So cute - even 'geeks' can be triumphant!!

We did alot of recovery on Friday - essential stuff, and things that might get damaged by being wet, as rain was expected in on Sunday and we were not planning to work on Sabbath. Some church members had expressed the desire to help us out on Sabbath, but we really felt we wanted to rest. So it was a race against time, to get out things that would be further damaged by rain. Alot was recovered that day - furniture, Electronics, etc. There were people who just showed up and asked to help. There were church members. There was Ed. Ed Hartano was there before US!! (we found out later that one of the neighbors thought he might be looting and came over and questioned him - NICE! and when he identified us by name, they knew he was helping, not looting - even in the midst of all this - neighbors being watchful and just generally sweet!) And he just kept going and going and going all day - in fact, I think he was one who had been there on Thursday, too. We have nick-named him 'Ed, the Energizer Bunny" We love Ed.

We tried to get out of there in plenty of time to get back to Showalter's place and get cleaned up in time for Sabbath but we were just a tad late. Lon started to get upset about it and Annie called him on it, and he reprimanded her for talking to her in a way inappropriate for a 'child' to talk to her parent. I was later able to point out to him that she is 17, and she has done a TON of growing up in the last 48 hours, and he might need to start thinking of her as a fellow adult. That was a bit of an eye opener. She has been great though, Even between the storms on Wed. She, Chip, Charlie, and another teen-aged neighbor boy were going around and rescuing people and checking on people, etc. She is just a work horse. She seems to deal with stress by digging in and getting busy. It's been nice to see that maturity and adult-like behavior.

Another sign of kids 'growing up' because of this - people had started offering to send us gift cards, and money, etc. And Sarah was so touched by that- she also said something very grown-up, though - "Mommy - we are saving alot of our stuff - can we share some of the money people send us with Nan and Doug" - It's so heartening to see how our family is pulling together, maturing, showing generosity and making do. I'm so proud of my kids.

When I left the house on Friday (this was part of what slowed us down) I made sure that the three little kids were packed and ready to go, because I was suspicious that a certain gal in the church would come get them. I was right, she showed up while I was back at the house spreading clothes out on the lawn. She and Winton took the three little ones and cared for them for us, so we didn't have to worry about them for the next few days while we focused on getting stuff out of the house. Tommy did NOT want to go. He was in tears - just not wanting to be apart from his sisters. But we talked him through it and he went, and in the end, he had a great time. I promised them, when they went that we would at least SEE each other by Tuesday. They ended up staying over there till Monday morning - and April brought them to us then.

We were beginning to gather info from various sources and had heard that there were 8 deaths in our county - that we knew of at that point, 5 of them were within a mile of our house. That was still such a sobering fact. It kept us focused on our gratitude that we were all alive. It was also interesting that Madison County was not yet listed on the FEMA Disaster list. But Friday evening one of the neighbors at Showalter's told us that it was because other counties get out and document and get included in the list first and then work on recovery. Madison county chooses to do it the other way around - they make sure their people are all safe, and THEN document and pursue the federal $$. I can live with that. ( we were included on the FEMA list officially on Monday )

We heard from Doug at one point, that a NOAA representative had come through the neighborhood and the preliminary assessments were that it was an EF4 that hit us. That we were only 10-15 mph under the divider between EF4 and EF5!! That is some POWERFUL work that nature accomplished!! The house has plant matter and glass shards and... well, you name it, embedded and plastered on it EVERYWHERE. Like someone took a spray gun and just splattered stuff everywhere.

Well - once again, the pain meds are doing their magic, and I'm dozing. I'll write about Sabbath tomorrow. And perhaps even have a minute to work on posting some pictures. Anyone who wants to send me some tips on that process - that would be helpful. I do find my brain, while able to be very focused on some things, at other times VERY scattered and unable to concentrate. Imagine that!