The family had been upstairs at the neighbors, listening to all the horrible noises outside, seeing the water rise outside their window. They did not realize that the entire first floor was full of water. Then, suddenly, the floor beneath their feet, grown sodden and brittle, gave way and they were all swimming in water. Then the pressure grew too strong for the walls and the water from the inside burst outward through a wide breach. They were being washed away.
The last words her husband said to her were, "Honey, this was my fault." He died a giant of the spirit, standing up and taking responsibility. Her mother-in-law, Jim's mother, a lifetime as a nurse, said to her, "I love you," and drifted off into the great beyond, unselfish and loving to the last. Then it was her turn. She was borne away on a sea of water, clinging somehow to her eight-year-old son.
They washed up against a group of trees still standing alongside the railroad track about a block and a half from where their home had stood. She managed to grab a floating door and wedge it between the trees at an angle that limited the force of water bearing down on them. A suitcase came by and she turned that into a sheltering tent for her son. The waters kept pushing her clothing tight around her neck, threatening to strangle her, so she ripped them off. And so they sat, in a makeshift fortress fashioned from flotsam, huddling against the storm's night of rage.
In the morning all was still again. They pulled themselves up, ragged and bedraggled, beaten and battered, and began to walk. Somewhere down the road a car pulled up alongside and they were driven to a shelter. Once her identity was discovered, people told her about seeing her younger son's rescue on TV. She headed immediately to the hospital, as dazed as she was, there to meet Jim shepherding her other child. They have all decided to go live with him in Tampa; his home family grew even as his extended family was ravaged.
Technorati Tags: flood aid, Hurricane Katrina
No comments:
Post a Comment