Aiding the Devastated

We arrived in High Island, Texas late at night on a Saturday. After a three hour flight and a two hour drive, we were quite exhausted and all we wanted to do was get to bed. Helping people would have to wait until morning.

We saw our bunks. A tarp stretched over a metal frame, and apparently once used by the South African army. They were more comfortable than I expected, but still not very comfortable. I hoped that I’d survive the week on the limited sleep I’d get on these beds.

We were staying at a church, in the Sunday school classrooms. All fourteen boys in one room, and the girls were divided between two smaller rooms; half in the small church library, and the others in a different classroom.

We woke up the next day, but I doubt any of us were very happy about it. After a night of suffocating heat and no AC, we were woken up at 6:30 for a breakfast of cereal, and after that, they were going to show us what we’d be doing for the next week.

We climbed into the vans and headed off down the Bolivar Peninsula. Out of the windows we saw the extent of the devastation caused by Hurricane Ike six months earlier. It looked like it happened a week ago. Cars were turned upside down by the side of the road, debris piled atop them. What had once been a block of vacation homes stood barren, nothing but the buildings’ foundations and peoples’ belongings strewn about. Devastation.

People here had lost everything. We got out of the vans and walked out toward the intercoastal waterway with our City Team guide, Cindy. We stepped over little kids’ toys, the remnants of someone’s elliptical machine, a mixer, a video tape. It was horrible. Our guide showed us a submerged ambulance, water filling the interior half way to its roof.

We were left speechless as Cindy told us a story about a man who was washed away from this area by the storm surge and who floated among the debris until he was found miles and miles away in bad condition. In finding something to float on, he had to fight off snakes and alligators who beat him there. Wow.

So, we continued on to one of the two worksites. Another Methodist church stood, mostly rebuilt. We unloaded sheetrock off the City Team truck, took a small water/bathroom break, and continued on.

We then arrived at Robert and Jerry’s house. What a sweet old couple. They lost everything but their house (which was badly damaged, still), yet they had smiles on their faces and were so positive throughout. They were our inspiration to keep working the whole time. They told us about their house before the storm, about the trees in their yard, the happy days they had there. That inspired us even more. So much history in this little area and we were there to make sure something remained.

During the week, we did loads of work on their house. We ripped off the siding that was rotting on the exterior walls, the we primed and painted the outside. There was a thick layer of mud in the yard that blocked the growth of grass, so we removed it. We ripped up the dead tree stumps, helped rebuild Robert’s work shed, and a whole bunch of other things.

We went home every night exhausted. Shower time was divided, with two groups (we had four: orange, green, purple, and white) showering before dinner and two groups after. For other “business” we used two port-o-potties outside, since thirty people couldn’t use one bathroom for a week without destroying the septic system it ran on.

In our free time, we had tons of board games and cards to entertain ourselves. We played Uno, Cranium, Apples to Apples, Poker, and other games. There was nothing else to do.

Well, by Thursday we had nearly finished doing all the work around Robert and Jerry’s house. We felt bad that they lost their gardens and their trees to the storm, so two of our chaperones made a home depot run and bought trees and flowers for us to plant. The look on the old couple’s face when we brought those flowers in will stick with me for life. They were nearly in tears as we placed all we had bought down on a board that was lying on the ground.

So, after putting the final touches of paint on the house, we began our gardening. We dug up what was left of the plants that used to be there and planted all the new ones: petunias, birds of paradise, jasmine, columbines, and other beautiful flowers. We also spread some grass seed in the yard we ripped up in the preceding days

At the end of that day, we said a final goodbye to Robert and Jerry as we made our way back to the church.  With promises of pictures of the flowers and trees when they grew tall and mighty, the old couple waved goodbye as we packed up the City Team truck, filled the vans, and left. Before we did, they asked us for a popsicle stick with every single one of our names on it, so they could remember us forever.

They were so greatful for our help. It was hard for them at first to even let us help, for they were so used to doing everything for other people and everything for themselves, used to giving instead of receiving. But we couldn’t let them refuse any of our help, and we did all we could to make it the best house anyone could ever live in. It was far from that, of course, but we were proud of what we could do in a single week.

The following Saturday, after a Friday break in Galveston, we packed up and left for the airport, but I think we left our hearts with the people of the Bolivar Peninsula, and most of all, with Robert and Jerry. I don’t think there’s a single person who went on this trip who wouldn’t go again given the chance.