“The house is gone,Sheila” These were the words my husband’s 80 year old godfather used to tell me we had lost our home in Hurricane Hugo. The sweet old dear hurriedly said,”I’m sorry, Sheila,but Robert told me to tell you just that way.” Looking back, there is no other way to tell someone that their house is gone. I didn’t know there were tornadoes inside a hurricane and one had slammed into our home and now we didn’t have one.
My husband Robert worked like a tiger to find us shelter. He kept reassuring me that we had insurance, that we’d be alll right. It took a year to rebuild our house but he was right. We were all right. We were alive, after all.
I know a lot of people who have lost their homes over the years. It doesn’t matter how you lose it. You can’t hear properly for a few minutes once you know it’s gone. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is real. Pray for all people who lose their homes. Pray for the people losing their homes in the fires out West and in Florida and Georgia, the people of Joplin, the people of Minot. Pray for everybody.