7-7-7

Sept 29th
Seven am to Seven pm, seven days a week.

Well I'm on day 8 of 12+ hrs a day. I'm not whining...but I am dragging today a bit. We're hearing some of the stories from Bridge City where the damage was pretty horrific. I haven't seen it personally, but we will get out there soon. I spoke with a woman who's house was completely flooded...mudded is more like it.

These folks are on the beginning of a long road to recovery. It will be months...maybe a year until they can rebuild. The beginning is dealing with insurers, registering with FEMA, bank issues, mortgage issues, finding a place to live until their houses are rebuilt/repaired. Many of them are housing relatives and friends (and neighbors they don't really know in some cases, bless their hearts). They're tired and frustrated and frazzled. Some will cry at the drop of a hat, but somehow they don't lash out at us. Sometimes they do a little, but they always rein it in and apologize. That amazes me. Most of these folks are beyond nice to us. I don't know if I'd be that nice to me if I were in their situation.

Today Thomas and I visited a dozen or so churches...they are doing great work for their communities as they always do. They help us get the word out about registering and make our job easier. One place was ramping down their shelter...the Southern Baptist Convention folks were out with the Chainsaws in that area...they are some neat people...'the chainsaw ministry' I've heard it called. They are trained at debris clearing and they do a GREAT job.

Tomorrow we're doing a town-hall meeting for Exxon Mobil in Beaumont. Their employees are coming to hear us talk about FEMA benefits, etc. Hopefully they'll be as nice to us as everyone else has...I'm sure they will.

Bad day in Beaumont

Well...it's like this: I had a bad day Sunday.

We were working a trailer park, a big one, in Beaumont. This wasn't a "Manufactured Home Community," this was a trailer park. The trailers there were crappy before the storm. These were held together with bailing wire and bad luck.

I felt that the only way the people in this park were going to be reached by our programs was to knock on the doors and tell them how to get help. So we went. Thomas and I did about half the park and did great. We even did well with the 50 percent of people who didn't 'habla Ingles' (I have GOT to get some language skills). Then another team joined us after lunch and we started in on the other half.

Things were going fine until we knocked on the crazy guy's trailer.

"I have a shotgun...step away from the trailer" he says. I started jogging and waved my teammates back to the car.

BOOM!

The cops claim that it was just him kicking his door open...I say bullshit. I know a 20 gauge when I hear it. So did the neighbors who were running with us.

After further analysis, I am most upset about the fact that this one crackpot caused a bunch of people who need help to not get it because our bosses are freaked out and won't let us back in the area.

Don't tell my wife...she'd freak. ;-)

Hurricane Ike...Back in the Saddle Again!

Hello,

I'm back in the saddle again for the response to Hurricane Ike. I've been here a week and this one has been pretty busy so that's why I haven't posted yet.

I'm working in Beaumont, TX and doing Community Relations work again. The area my team is assigned to, Jefferson County, was hit very hard by the storm. In the area of the City of Beaumont that I'm working, the damage is mostly from wind. East Texas has pines...the 'piney woods'...in the neighborhoods, there are these magnificent pine trees, 80 foot tall and two feet thick. They tend to snap off at the top and skewer houses. There are also big Oak trees that are shallow-rooted and these tend to uproot and just crush what they fall on.

The scale of this disaster is MUCH more widespread than the Wisconsin floods from this summer. Most of the homes here have at least some damage. There is much more devastation here as well...debris, etc. I'll try to post some pictures soon to give you a feel for what things look like here.

It is nice to be back among Texans again...

More later...I'm off to work this beautiful Sunday morning.