Mississippi Trip – Thursday

I began the morning by getting up at 5 to do everyone a favor and buy doughnuts. So I threw on my clothes and headed out the door as quietly as I could. It had been a bit cool so the van had a thick sheen of moisture on the front. This didn't help the fact that I decided I could go driving without my contacts (truly, my eyesight isn't very bad, but with the misty window it really exacerbated (made worse for all you miseducated ones) the problem. It was so bad that two blocks later I had to stop and put in my contacts.

So I drive around for about 10 minutes not finding anything. I mean, even the coffee place wasn't open, how crazy is that?

About the time that I pass the coffee shop it occurs to me...

It's Thanksgiving!

Honestly, it sure didn't feel much like it. After yesterday and with being on vacation and being away from family, today just seemed like any other day. I was thinking about the work we might be doing that day, hoping I'd be in the same group of people. Eating turkey was pretty far from my mind.

One nice thing was that someone brought a fried turkey to the work camp Wednesday night. So I did have (for the first time ever) a bit of fried turkey. I have to say, it was darned good! Again, since it happened Wednesday, it didn't help today feel much like a holiday. The great thing was that I didn't care. I'd been having such a great time, I really looked forward to what today would bring.

So one person got up early and proceeded to wake up almost everyone else so they could head back to the camp site for a shower (I was none to pleased). It sounded like everyone was making a ton of noise. Then the rest of us lazily got up, headed out for breakfast, and got to the camp site just in time to head out to the work sites.

The first place we visited was surprisingly far away from the water. We kept moving farther and farther from the beach and it really struck me how much damage has been done. In Mississippi they have these houses sitting essentially on stilts. I can only assume this is to protect against floods. While we drove down the road (again, we were miles from the beach) some of these houses had been completely removed from their foundation.

We got to the woman's house, who I barely met for more than a minute (and so I don't know her name), and got to work. First “we” moved a refrigerator from the front lawn to the street for pickup. I say “we” but really it was other people. It smelled so bad that as soon as it was picked up I couldn't stand it. I and a few other people actually had to move to the back of the house for about 10 minutes while the smell faded (it never went away). It wasn't until later that I realized the main cause of the smell was simply the stagnant water.

So we set to work almost immediately. After going through a day of work together (we did have essentially the same group as yesterday) we were pumped and ready to work again. We needed to clear out a lot of pine needles and other mess so that the homeowner could re-seed the lawn.

The house had been completely gutted. There were only supporting beams, the floors and walls had been removed. Some people swept out the house, others raked the lawn, and some people formed a tight line and removed all glass from the front yard.

Thinking back it sounds small, but it really didn't feel that way. As we worked things really did start looking better and better. I felt great getting to work around the house.

There were some trash bags stuck about 10 to 20 feet up in the trees beside the property which Bethany, Christine and some others decided to clean up. Dave lifted Bethany up into some of the trees to grab the higher bags; it was pretty great to see.

One of the more fun moments for me was when I got to shimmy up a tree and grab the last two tags sitting on the end of some branches about 20 feet up. Getting up there wasn't so bad, but standing on the top of two rickety trees really kind of freaked me out. It got a little better when my cell phone rang, since talking to the person took my mind off of being so high up.

After a lot of the work had been done Rob and Tim decided it made sense to turn over the shed and put it back on its footers. What really made that cool was that everyone had to get involved. A bunch of us were turning or moving the shed, others were cleaning up some of the insulation or sticks which were in the way.

While we were moving around the shed another group showed up from the work camp. They'd finished their job and heard we needed a shed flipped (who in the world would turn that down). So we all flipped over the shed, moved it around and even put any valuables back into the shed to keep them out of the elements. It felt good to make that work out. This was the one time when it felt like we were really building a little bit, clearing and getting things ready for the owner, instead of the constant clearing and moving of rubble.

It was about lunch time but none of us were ready to quit. This was especially true since we knew there wasn't going to be any working in the afternoon. So we headed off to another home and cleared out a fence which had been blown over.

This also included carrying some appliances out to the street. Reality hit me a bit, just looking at some of what happened. That entire sections of fence and the poles (concrete and all) were lying on their side. Or that freezers and refrigerators were moved way away from houses. The amazing power that water has... It's scary.

As a side, this was the time I got to share in a friend's oddness. A bunch of people in the other van had ring pops on the way to this site. I hadn't talked to Amber much that day, but it was so funny seeing her with blue lips, blue tongue and even blue teeth from the ring pop. I think Michael or Dave said it looked like she was turning into a Smurf from the inside out.

We went back to the work camp ready for lunch. And since this has been an incredibly long entry, I'll break it up here and finish this afternoon.

Peace,
+Tom/Bob

posted by Tom at 10:44 AM