Off The Beaten Path

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Georgia, United States
Some people come into our lives and quickly go. Some people move our souls to dance. They awaken us to new understanding with the passing whisper of their wisdom. Some people make the sky more beautiful to gaze upon. They stay in our lives for awhile, leave footprints on our hearts, and we are never ever the same.

Friday, September 26

After the Storm








Eight years ago when I moved to Effie, I stayed a few nights in a local Motel. It is a rather pretty place with an old house on the grounds, and the Motel units up front. It is called the Terrace Inn and I stayed here long ago when I bought my house. So it only seemed right that at the end of my life here in Louisiana, I once again stay at the Terrace Inn. But this time it isn't quite as much fun, nor do I feel the anticipation of beginning a new life in a place that I love. Now it is the ending, and although I know that I need to wind things down, get things all done and get the heck out of here, I am moving rather slowly.

Today I cut up limbs, and stacked boards into piles. One pile I have pulled out the nails, and are long enough to use to board up windows. The other pile still has nails and are to short to be of any use on the windows. I borrowed a chainsaw and cut up some limbs and started a pile of wood to burn. Which is kind of strange since I won't ever be using it, nor do I have any plans to do anything with this wood. It is kind of funny how the brain functions under this kind of trauma, you select things to save that seem to have no significant monetary value, but for some reason they are very important to you. I pulled little pictures and notes off of bulletin boards, notes, cards, things like that. I needed to keep these. The kitchen was the worst, it was full of things that I really didn't need, yet I had a hard time getting rid of them.

The kids bedroom wasn't difficult, there wasn't anything in there that was able to be saved. Everything was pretty much destroyed. Their beds all came apart, the ceiling fell in on things and broke much of what was on the walls. My bedroom, pretty much the same thing. My bedding was destroyed by the ceiling falling in on it. My clothes were pretty nasty, but I washed them and did save some of them. The computer was destroyed as was the CD player above the computer. All of the pictures on the walls are still hanging, because they are ruined. Glassware was knocked off of the shelves and they are laying crushed under tons of debris. It is a mess. I knocked out a few windows, one so that I could get inside, and another that I couldn't open just so that the air could circulate. The smell of mildew is pretty sickening.

Today I sold the wood off the walls in the music room, it was knotty pine, years old, and very pretty. And the kitchen cabinets were also bought. I helped them take them down, it was quite a job. But we got it done. When they were out of the kitchen the house looked so empty and sad. The ceiling fell in completely in the dining room and half of the living room. You can see daylight in the living room when you look up, because the boards are partly gone. It can rain now, there isn't much left in the house that can be ruined. I saved what I could, hired a moving van and had the stuff sent to Georgia and placed in storage. The piano I had delivered to the kids. Ana said that it is pretty good now that they have had fans and a dehumidifier on it for a week. The keys have leveled out. I lost my couch and chair in the music room, and the guitar that was up against the wall was full of water. But the warp back has flattened out again. I don't play guitar, so I guess it really doesn't matter. The violin was in a case and up on the top shelf and it survived without damage. I don't play it either, but I am glad it wasn't ruined. .

The floor of the house is littered with curtains, food taken out of the frig, ceiling tiles, rugs, mud, ................people came in and "helped" but basically they were just going through my stuff to see what they could take or "buy." When you are under stress you have a tendency to not think to clearly and I gave a lot of stuff away just to get rid of it. I had a shed full of tools that somehow managed to disappear, as did both of my garbage cans. People just came in and took things. But I really didn't care that much at the time. Now it kind of pisses me off. Oh well, they have to live with themselves, what goes around comes around. Maybe when their house blows down I can "help" them?

3 comments:

Burfica said...

oh my gosh, I am soo sooo so very sorry!!!

Pete said...

Nea

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All I can do from here, sorry

Pete;-(
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Lo Kelween said...

it's very sad to hear news like that.

and the word "help" really doesn't serve its actual meaning anymore in today's society, isn't it. sigh...