The Fire

I recently entered an essay about the Salem Fire Department for a contest run by Firedog.  I was compelled to write the essay because I lost my home in a fire two years ago and it was these firefighters who responded that night.  This month Firedog will choose 10 finalists, post the stories on their website and have America vote for their favorite.  For every vote cast, a $1.00 donation is given to that firehouse.  This is in addition to the $20,000 they get by being selected as one of the top 10.  The first place winner is awarded the grand prize of $100,000.  Once they select the top 10, I will post my essay.  Until then, to give you some history, I have republished my column below about the night of the fire.

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It’s probably about 2 a.m., the day after tax day and I am watching a fire envelope not one but two houses. There are several people standing around with looks of concern and fear on their faces. It isn’t their house on fire but it may be.

 

This has been this close-knit neighborhood’s nightmare for generations. The houses built so close together. Winds blowing off the ocean. Flames licking at the side of two houses. Will it spread? Is this the fire that will wipe out the entire street…neighborhood?

 

I am beyond fear at this point. I have seen and heard of fires such as these many times before. I was a Disaster Action Team Member with the Red Cross for several years. My father is a Lieutenant on the Saint John Fire Department in Canada.

 

I recall red stickers on our windows to tell fire fighters where the bedrooms were, learning to crawl on our knees under the “smoke” and checking doors for heat before opening them. I recall seeing my dad three days before the evening of this fire.I begin thinking about the next day and how tired I will be at all of my meetings if I don’t get some rest. It is April and I am cold standing outside. I go inside and can’t warm up.

 

Someone investigating the fire wants to ask me questions. I feel like a suspect of a crime and I am nervous. I am not sure suddenly if what I said I witnessed is the exact truth. It all happened so fast.“There was an explosion…not a huge explosion, but a bang”, I say. “Then the flames raced up the side of the houses.”“It was between the houses…no I don’t know what could of started it…no I don’t know what the explosion/bang could be…”I am still cold.Yes, I am beyond fear at this point. I am not worried whether it will be my house next or whether this fire will spread. The house on fire is mine. The irony of it all is not lost on me.The Red Cross arrives.“Oh my…one of our own volunteers”, they realize.$75.00 they give me for food. Suddenly the work that I had done for 10 years with them seemed so inadequate now that I realized how much is lost by a family in a disaster and how little of that a bag of toiletries and $75.00 would cover.

 

Nonetheless, I appreciated that they were there for me. But then I am back to reality and next steps.

 

I am a single mom with a dog. Nobody rents to people with dogs. My family is hundreds of miles away. What will I do with $75.00? I am homeless with a little girl who just turned four the week before and a dog.

 

I am not alone however. Ten other people lost the place they called home that night.Over a decade of disaster management experience did and did not prepare me for this. Certainly, I responded quickly and decisively. (Once I realized it wasn’t drunk teenagers banging outside my house). It was a multifamily house and there was another mom with 2 boys on the top two floors. Within seconds, I and a neighbor raced up to get them out of the house.

 

I immediately began thinking of the next days schedule and an upcoming business trip and how would I go about cancelling the next day’s meetings and at the same time borrowing clothes for the following week’s trip. Where would we live? Begin the process with the insurance company. (Adjusters are both a blessing and curse) Survive. Focus.I am not the first person in disaster management to endure a personal disaster. I am grateful it wasn’t happening to me at the same time as the community around me.

 

Fate waited to deal me that blow a year later with the floods that hit the Northeast in May 2006. One disaster a year. Not bad! I am obviously not the only person to lose their home in a fire or disaster. I am grateful I had a great deal more to rely on than most…friends, colleagues, a great career and a steady paycheck.But I learned something. We are all expected to pick up the pieces on our own. Granted, I received tremendous support. Fundraisers by colleagues and friends. My daughter’s caregivers opened their home to us. Yet, the recovery is long.

 

People expect you to be back on your feet within days or a few weeks at most. But it was more than a year before the magnitude of the loss hit me. The cumulative financial impact.

 

Watching my daughter still mourn the loss of her “babies” in that fire. Looking for something that I just know I have and then realizing that, of course, I don’t.

 

Even for those of us where life is relished and opportunity embraced, the recovery is long. It reinforces how important it is that vulnerable populations not be forgotten in disaster and that women and children are often part of that group.

 

It also reminds me how so many people think the disaster is over once the media finds something else to cover. Obvious human suffering is newsworthy. The quiet suffering and private tears are not.

 

Disasters large and small have all the same characteristics by those impacted by them. The fire at my house made the front page of the newspaper the next day. The day after that it was forgotten by most.

 

For us, the work was just beginning.