Life After Hurricane Harvey

At the end of summer last year everything was going just fine.  It was hurricane season but as a Texan this is just something you live through six months out of the year.  Some years there are no hurricanes that come near the coastline and other years there is a hurricane developing every week. 

Then there was the year for Hurricane Harvey. It seemed to start out as any other hurricane.  So you prepare yourself and you make sure you have enough water and food in case the electricity goes out.  You make sure anything you own that could blow away it put away.  You batten down the hatches and you wait and waited is what we did.

Hurricane Harvey had hit the Texas coast near Rockport and Corpus Christi and did a lot of wind damage to those folks in those towns.  Harvey decided to go back offshore and come back again towards Houston and sit on us for five days.  The rain was outrageous.  The streets were flooded.  People were stranded.  People who had never flooded before, flooded.  Whole neighborhoods were destroyed.

The rain kept coming.  Our yard looked like a lake.  We are used to rain in Houston but this was different.  It was flowing like a creek and it was getting higher and higher.  Then it happened. The thing that had never happened to this house….water started to come in.  I thought it would come in the front or back door if we were to actually get water in the house but instead the flooding water started seeping through the wall in the dining room.  Once we started flooding everything started going in fast motion.  We had to gather animals and clothing and get out NOW.  Looking out the window to the driveway I didn’t know if our vehicles would make it down the street.

After quickly loading our stuff and getting into the cars, the water was at door level.  Anymore rain and it would be in my car.  The rain was coming down so hard.  I couldn’t see the road.  What road isn’t flooded? How am I going to make it out of here?  My son called and said he couldn’t make it back to my road in his truck because the water was so high. 

I followed my husband in his truck and me in my Durango.  As I was going through high water I just kept my foot on the gas….don’t let water in the exhaust.  I thought I was going to get swept off the road but we made it to my in-laws.  We were safe.

Two days later we came back home.  Water was out of my house but not out of my yard.  People in a boat went by in my front yard.  Yes, wonderful citizens of our town were still looking for anyone that needed rescuing.  As I went into my house, the first thing that hit me was the smell.

It was now time to tear down and rebuild.  Come with me on our journey.