Thank you everyone.
I’m fine.
And Britt, Jared, and the kids made it here safely, thank God. I haven’t seen them yet because, rightfully so, their focus is on helping their Jared’s parents and Jared’s brother and sister-in-law and their babies.
I can tell you that everything is changed. Nothing is the same, and I don’t know that it ever will be again.
That I have seen horror and heroism I have never seen the likes of before - and never want to again.
That the photos and videos you see don’t begin to capture what it’s like.
That it’s like walking on the face of the moon. You can’t tell where you are in a town where all your kids grew up - a town you know every inch of - because all the landmarks are gone.
And that I have come to the humbling realization that most of the shit upon which I have been spending my precious time, energy, and thoughts - just doesn’t mean shit.
Whether or not someone likes me, how someone should act or respond to me, or think, or speak, or dress.
The man I ran away from at the end of March - when he heard a tornado was on its way toward me and Creed and he couldn’t get me on the phone - he jumped in his car and headed right into it to get to me to make sure I was safe. Luckily, all he hit was the debris, and made it into Parkersburg minutes after the 15 second toranado took everything. He stayed there because there were bodies everywhere, and he is trained to handle those things. And with phone service out all he could do was attend to the task at hand, and pray for me.
I have heard a lot of songs and read a lot of books and magazine articles about what love is, and I could have told you very clearly on Sunday afternoon what I believe love is.
A few hours later I knew it in my bones.
Being a nurse, as soon as I was assured that I was OK and my residents were OK, I raced into the same war zone and spent the rest of the day helping people I’ve known most of my adult life,
And searching for him. Asking every fireman I saw where his crew was. Asking every familiar face if they’d seen him.
And then I found him.
And I got down on my knees in the rubble and the rain and with the shell shocked people wandering around me and asked him to forgive me for my self indulgence, my arrogance, my holier-than-thou bullshit.
This morning is the first morning that we had more than a few hours’ worth of sleep at a time. I will go back to work here in a few hours because the most productive thing I can do is to calm the fears of those I am resposible for, many of whom lost their homes, or their families did, and can’t comfort them.
And work for co-workers who have lost everything and don’t know when they will be able to come in again.
Everyone has been touched and I know, more than anything, that I am blessed beryond measure. None of mine went to the hospital while the rest of us searched for them. There was one terrifying moment on Sunday night when the man and I searched frantically for Creed, who had spent the day pulling people out from under destruction, carrying food and water from one staging area to the next and had given his cell phone without a thought to a woman trying frantically to reach her family.
Running from place to place, asking everyone “Have you seen Creed? Have you seen my son?” And the mud stained, bleak faces of my friends and neighbors, shaking their heads. “He was here a while ago.”
I could give a shit now about karaoke or - gosh. Anything.
Except my children and grandchildren. And collecting underwear for people, and diapers and formula. And holding the hands of the elderly refugees who have come to us, bandaged, fractured, lacerated and sutured, who ask over and over again, “Tell me again what happened. I don’t understand what happened.”
Hug your children and grandchildren.
