So… we had a couple crazy, CRAZY days of rain, lots of stuff was underwater for a few days, but NOW it’s bad. Real bad.
On Friday, my boss allowed us to take a half day and go help one of the various flood clean-up volunteer groups. The amount of volunteers helping that day was quite astonishing - It actually took me a little while to find a group that needed more volunteers. The group we ended up helping was a community group that has been meeting at ArtHouse Gardens daily in East Nashville. Not knowing what to expect, I was quite impressed with their organization - they were finishing lunch (which local businesses have been so generous with supplying), and as we arrived, and we were quickly pointed towards the shirts we were to wear (so no one would think we were looters) and the supplies and bottled water we were to take with us to the site.
After gathering our supplies, we were directed to head to a neighborhood in Inglewood (where, oddly, Ryan and I had looked at a house for sale a year and a half ago…). I can’t begin to describe the scene. As this neighborhood is very close to the Cumberland, most houses were underwater until Wednesday, I believe. You could see the water line on the houses, and each house had a big, bright orange “X” on the door. Outside of the houses were piles of trash - not only wood and scraps from the actual house, but personal belongings like stacks of records, clothes, furniture, etc.
Once we parked and found a house that needed our help, we went inside and found that it was completely soaked. Oh, and the SMELL was something that I really wasn’t prepared for. But, yeah… the carpet was soaked with water, and everything knee-level and below was wet and covered with a sludge film. The first girl we helped had just moved into her house a month before the flood, so she had a couple boxes that she hadn’t unpacked which were now at least half-full with water. It was insane.
We ended up clearing out two houses and doing some work on another before we called it a day… This stuff was INTENSE and there is so much work to do. It’ll take weeks - probably months even - before it’s even close to back to normal. I know that what I did barely put a dent in the clean-up, and I’m in awe of those who have been out there day after day, doing this extremely hard work just because they know it’s the right thing to do.
The thing that stuck with me the most about the experience is the people - there were so many people who had put in DAYS of this work (and I’m sure they’re out there working right now, too)… This completely awful thing that has happened to our city is really showing us what our people are made of. I’m completely inspired by the willingness of people to pitch in and help out. I love Nashville and I love you all. :)
The fact that there are people out there like the ones I met Friday makes me believe that we’re all going to be alright. It honestly makes me think that it won’t be so bad to someday bring a child into this world, which at times seems to be so harsh and cold. It’s weird that it sometimes takes a tragedy to show us these things…
Oh, and the picture from above wasn’t taken by me or anyone else I was with… I just pulled it from the internet to show what kind of situation we went into. Insanity.
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