tablets of human hearts

Day 13

We arrived in Mississippi after dark, so I was unable to see the destruction and devastation in increasing measure.  Rather, I arrived in a shroud of darkness, knowing that tomorrow I will wake to see the changed world so many have been living in for the past two weeks.

We left San Antonio around 10 am.  The van started acting up again between San Antonio and Houston.  It does seem to be a fuel problem, because Jon dumped some fuel stuff in the tank and after we filled back up again with gas, it seemed to run fine.

Houston was a mess to drive through, with all the traffic, construction and pouring down rain.  Once we got out of Houston, the rest of the drive was pretty quick and smooth.

Around Baton Rouge, we started to see some of the snapped trees in increasing number as we drove east.

Jon and I drove straight to our house, since Jon had a token of appreciation to deliver to our neighbors for their hospitality when Jon and Bob were conducting damage control on our house.  As we drove into Diamondhead, the tears started.  The normally busy and bright entrance to Diamondhead was dark.  The entrance road was covered in broken trees.  My tears flowed more as we drove down Analii and saw entire households, people’s lives, memories and comforts, piled out on the side of the road.   The piles were huge.  The only homes that did not have piles in the front were homes that looked like the owners had not come back yet.  My heart was breaking for the pain and suffering each of our neighbors were going through.  We stopped in front of my house, but I did not go in, since it was dark and after curfew.  I just looked at the pile of our stuff laying along side the road.  I chose not to look too closely.  We chatted with our neighbors for a few minutes.  They only had a couple of inches in their house, however the power was still out.

We spent the night at Staci and Bob’s.  They have electricity (AIR CONDITIONING) and water, but not cable or internet access.  Tomorrow, we’ll get up, and if time permits, stop by the house before going to church.  Then Rocky and Matthew are supposed to come over with Jon and Bob to help finish ripping out carpet and kicking holes in our wall.

Some impressions that I thought interesting:  There’s Humvees with national guard soldiers driving through our neighborhood, along with the occasional helicopter.  Jon and Bob like to share their stories of the stench from the spoiled meat in the freezers and fridges when they cleaned it out.  Staci and I truly appreciate the men taking care of that for Staci and me.  Jon has also speculated that my cedar chest actually exploded from the water pressure building up from within.

Grace & Peace

Day 12

Another very tiring day.  Jon and Bob finally made it back around 1030 last night.  Jon thinks they may have had some bad gas, because once they topped off the tank, the van seemed to be okay.  We woke up way earlier than we wanted to.  Jon took Jonny to his doctor’s appointment for his arm and obtained a power of attorney for care for the kids, as did Bob and Staci.  Heather and I loaded up all the wet laundry that Jon brought back and went to the laundry mat.  We did about 15 loads of laundry; however some of the clothes were unsalvageable.  Thankfully, our hanging clothes seemed fine, so Jon left them at the house.  Heather and I finished up the laundry sometime after lunch.  We shared our story with some of the laundry mat customers and a sweet lady offered us $5 toward our laundry expenses.  The kindness of people is so encouraging.  I also dropped off our bed skirt and duvet at the cleaners.  With the cost of dry cleaning, I sometimes wonder if it’s cheaper to buy new.  Jon and dad took the big screen TV to a repair shop for an assessment.  The TV only had about an inch of water up the side, but the repair shop doesn’t know how that will affect an LCD screen or whether it can be fixed.  We’ll see.  Jon and dad also took the van in to be serviced.  The tires were getting pretty worn and Heather had the unfortunate experience of hitting a dog not too long ago that knocked out the front alignment a bit.  We still have to pack everything up for our trip tomorrow for an early departure, because we have to arrive before the 8 pm curfew.  Jon, Bob, Staci and I decided that since our anniversaries wouldn’t be very much fun (theirs is the 19^th and ours is the 22^nd) that we should celebrate it early.  So we went out to dinner to Joe’s Crab Shack.  After a very enjoyable and relaxing dinner, we topped off the evening with trips to Sam’s and Home Depot to purchase more cleaning supplies for our trip back to Mississippi.

We’ll be heading out tomorrow and I don’t know when I’ll have email capabilities again.  Bob and Staci have electricity but their cable internet isn’t back up yet and neither is our Bell South dsl.  I will continue to keep a log of our work and send out the updates when I can.

We appreciate your prayers and I’ll need them more then ever as we head back into the devastated areas and I see our home for the first time.

God bless.

In His care

Grace & Peace

Day 11

I had a hard time sleeping last night.  Some of that may have had to do with the fact that since Jon was away, I was sleeping with Jonny.  He was all over the bed, putting feet in my back and trying to steal my pillow.  He and Samantha both were not very excited about waking up and going to school this morning, but we got them on their way.  Staci and I had some plans for the morning time, but decided that our errands fit better with Jonny’s doctor appointment tomorrow.  So we relaxed most of the day and I was able to type my community outreach email; however my emotions did feel a bit brittle throughout the morning.  I think I’m anxious to be doing something.  Jon called before he and Bob left Diamondhead.  Jon said that the houses to the east of ours suffered very little while the houses to the west of ours had progressively deeper water damage.  A lot of our things are out in a pile at the end of the driveway. My boss, who lived about a mile from us, had about five feet of water in his house.  Jon and Bob will help him with damage control once our house is stabilized. They stopped by their command at Stennis Space Center on the way out.  I guess most everyone there is working disaster relief and they want Jon to report to work Monday.  I will also be assigned to disaster teams when I return.  We’ll need to stop by the BX at the Air Force Base to see if they have Navy shoes.  Ours were ruined when our house flooded.  Although I’m anxious to make our home livable, I know it will be awhile before that happens and I do want to be able the help those who are worse off than we are.

Please continue to pray for us.  Jon and Bob called about 160 miles from San Antonio.  The van started acting up.  Apparently, the engine is missing and stalling.  They’re able to start it back up and keep going, but the stalling keeps happening.  While I’m typing this, they are about 100 miles out still.  I hope we don’t have to drive out to get them tonight.  Tomorrow, we’ll have to take the van in to get it checked out and fixed.  Thankfully, mom and dad said we could use their suburban, if we need to.  Hopefully our van will be a quick fix.  As you can imagine, with two of our vehicles damaged by flood waters, we really don’t need the van to be having issues.

May God bless all of you who are involved in efforts to aid the victims of Katrina.  So many people may have the opportunity for a better life for themselves and for their children.  But many people are also wondering how to start over again. The Lord can turn a disaster into something good, if we trust in Him and turn the situation completely over to him.

In His care

Grace & Peace

Day 10

We woke up in Mullin Texas this morning and took Daniel and Spencer to register them in school.   The school in Mullin is very small: Spencer is the 5^th kid in his 6^th grade class and I think Daniel has about 12 in his freshman class. They both seemed like they will be fine there, although, Staci had a hard time saying goodbye to Spencer. We then thanked Vonnie for opening up their home to the boys and left, driving the 2 ½ hours back to San Antonio. While we were driving, Jon called to tell me about his meeting with the FEMA representative. All of our damaged rooms were noted and Jon was told to get our claims processed with our insurance companies. Once our insurance determines what will be and will not be covered (not much), FEMA can process our claim to cover what the insurance companies did not. When we got back to mom’s house, I called USAA to request their denial of coverage letter, since we do not have flood insurance. I also called our other insurance company that covers wind storm damage; an assessor will call us back to schedule an appointment. Jon will call USAA about the vehicles tomorrow.

After I was done with the phone calls, I took my car to be washed. Around the middle of August, I purchased a car wash at the gas station in Diamondhead. However, when I went out to take my car through the wash, a maintenance man had it closed and was doing maintenance on it. I figured I’d wash my car another day, the car wash code was good until the 30^th. The following week I went on a trip to San Diego. No worries. I figured I’d get my car washed when I got back. That Friday, I was at the airport baggage claim in New Orleans when Jon called and told me about Katrina. We were so busy the remainder of the weekend getting ready to evacuate, that I never had it washed. Needless to say, I don’t know when that gas station car wash will open again. And by now, I can barely see through the windshield. Dad had a coupon for a local full car wash service, so I took my car. The attendant at the car wash service even threw in some free tire detailing – I think he saw my Mississippi plates.

This evening, I took Heather, Staci, Samantha and Jonny to Barnes and Noble. I bought Jonny a couple of Magic Tree House books; he was collecting them but they, of course, were ruined in the flood waters. I bought him the next couple in the series that he hasn’t read. Jonny was very happy to hear that his plastic bin of stuffed animals floated and stayed dry, as did his legos. His bed of stuffed animals must have been an ark, because Jon said everything on it was dry. Jonny’s tortoise that was outside in his cage also floated. Jon found the cage in a different location in the yard, but the tortoise was fine.

A very tired Jon called again this evening. He and Bob were showering, eating and resting after a very exhausting day. They cleaned out the refrigerators and freezers (a very nasty job), ripped the carpet out of most of our house, pulled up baseboards, put holes in the bottom of the walls (so the walls can start drying inside), ripped out wet insulation, moved unsalvageable furniture to the street and bagged wet clothes. They plan to head out tomorrow morning and drive back here to Texas. We’ll wash as many of the clothes we can on Friday, pack up and (the four of us) head back to Mississippi on Saturday.

We did find out today that Heather’s college will resume classes on September 19^th.   She’s very anxious to get back to school, as you can imagine. Hancock school district is hoping to be up and running by mid October. We haven’t decided when the rest of the kids will return to Mississippi, but we will have to figure out what we’ll do with Jonny once Heather returns to school, since mom and dad get up and leave for work very early. Jonny also needs to stay in an area where he can keep his doctor’s appointments until his cast comes off. One day at a time, one decision at a time.

Another late evening and I need to get some sleep. The days seem to slip by so quickly. Good night.

Grace & Peace

Day 9

Today has been very exhausting. Jon and Bob got up early and left for Mississippi. I couldn’t get back to sleep. The rest of us had to get up earlier than we have been since we evacuated, so we could get the kids going in school. We took Jonny down to the elementary school and tried to enroll him. Unfortunately, the school that we told him he would be attending was capped (it was the school his daddy went to as a little boy – which made it a little special). So we ended up going to another school nearby, which was just as good, just not the one we were expecting. It may be a blessing in disguise, because he will be entitled to bus service, which might make things easier in the long run. While we were enrolling him, several other evacuee families were enrolling their children. Jonny has a little girl in his class who is from north New Orleans. We were able to sign Jonny up for after school care; dad will pick him up when he’s done with work. Mom asked the YMCA (who is running the after school care) to check on the situation with the evacuees. Since we were evacuees, Jonny is eligible for free tuition, which saves us $273 this month. Staci also enrolled Samantha in high school, the same high school Jon graduated from. She seems pretty okay with the situation and Heather will take her to school tomorrow (after she drops off Jonny) and make sure she gets settled in. After lunch, Staci and I loaded the boys up in the car and headed up to Bubba and Vonnie’s in Mullin. It was a 2 ½ drive so we packed our bags too and planned on spending the night and enrolling the boys in the morning. From the minute we arrived, the boys were out running around. They are very excited about spending some time in the country. Bubba and Vonnie have about 7 aces, a horse, a donkey, a goat, dogs (including ours), cats, a bird and a slew of chickens. Tomorrow we’ll take the boys over to the school to enroll them. I think they each will have less than 10 kids in their entire class. We’re hoping that all the kids will do well with where they’re at; although the boys are against the idea of going to school and Jonny says he doesn’t like his new school. They all need to settle into a routine. They’ve been staying up until midnight every night and sleeping in until noon, if we let them. Not a very healthy routine for them. Please pray for the adjustments. Thankfully, being military kids, they are better equipped than most kids to deal with school transfers. And pray for Staci; it’s going to be hard for her to be separated from Spencer, he’s her youngest and she’s never had to leave him anywhere.

I received a phone call from Jon. He and Bob made it to Diamondhead okay. They said that pictures don’t do the devastation justice; it’s really bad. Bob and Staci’s house only had a tree in the back porch screen and a rank smell from the spoiled meat in their deep freeze. Bob also has electricity and running water already. After unloading the vehicle, they drove over to another friend’s house (Mark Burton had just purchased his house in Diamondhead; he and his family are still in Hawaii). Their house fared fine, but about 100 yards out the back yard, it looked like a tornado had gone through. As Jon and Bob were driving over to our house, Jon saw entire households piled up on the curbs; all the ruined furniture and items that had been cleaned out of other flooded homes. Then they arrived at our house.   Jon said our house looked bad on the inside. Our Sante Fe still had standing water in it. Jon couldn’t get into Heather’s car because she forgot to give him the keys, but she had a thick fungus growing on her steering wheel. The refrigerator in the garage had fallen over in the storm surge, mildew is growing all over our kitchen cabinets, the doors on my china hutch are warped, the bathroom floors are covered in black mud and the most heart breaking of all: my cedar chest had disintegrated in the water. Jon didn’t look around too much, but he said that my cedar chest with all my memories, all my journals, all my yearbooks, was just gone. He didn’t bother to look to see if his cruise book and Antarctica stuff survived. Jonny’s books were also ruined, because they were all on the bottom shelves of his book case, where he could easily reach them. Jon did say that our mattress (that we are still making payments on) must have floated on the box springs, because it was fine. He moved it upstairs. A blessing. The jury is still out on his big screen tv (that we are still making payments on). It looked okay, but he hasn’t tested it yet. Our back yard looked like a war zone also.

So, I cried. And I’ll cry some more between now and when I see it. And I’ll cry a lot when I’m actually there. I’ll try to remember that all our possessions (even my writing) belongs to the Lord, it is His to do with as He sees fit. I’ll try to remember that so many have suffered far more than we have. But it will still be hard. And I’ll still ask God why. And I’ll cry, so that the Lord can begin the healing process. Because that is what we all need. It will take time. It will take love and strength and endurance beyond what we have on our own. But the Lord will see us through and we will make it. I thank God for the family and friends who are here for us in our time of need. I thank God for the important things. And I share this all with you, that you might understand what so many others are also facing.

Please keep praying for us.

God bless.

Grace & Peace