The next several weeks were a blur to me. I barely remember going to Walmart the next morning to get basics, like toothbrushes and a second set of clothes for each of us that didn’t smell of smoke. We went to several emergency booths and donation centers to gather things we needed and start all the paperwork. If I’d had a full-time job at the time, I don’t know how I would have been able to get everything done or even focus, since my emotional state was subpar at the time. But somehow we managed to get through it all, slowly but surely.

We still had not been allowed to go see if our home survived or not; about a week or so after the fire they finally gave us the all-clear. We asked my parents to watch our daughter, and Lane and I drove the twenty minutes to our property.

When we reached our road, we had another two and a half miles to go. At first, everything seemed normal besides the heavy layer of smoke still hovering in the air. But after about a mile, we started to see the evidence – burned trees, ashes where houses once stood, fences that disappeared, and other fire victims crying as they learned whether their homes survived or not. The fire had no rhyme or reason – one house would be burned down, while the one next to it stood tall as though nothing happened. We had a pretty good idea which outcome we were about to find at our own home, and unfortunately, we were correct.

When we got there, all that remained was our chicken coop and the pump house for our well. Mounds of ashes lay where our house and garage once had been. Our metal shed that I used for hay and my riding tack was in scorched pieces, scattered across the land. My husband’s Harley that had been parked in the garage was now barely a frame, with most of it burned away and roofing laying on top of it. I could see the springs and the brackets from my daughter’s crib. Our fridge was melted into itself in a boxy blob. We had a brand-new security screen door on the front, which was now laying randomly among the ashes and had turned to orange rust.

My husband picked up a teacup from the ashes where our kitchen had been. He asked if I wanted to keep it; it had belonged to my late grandma. My eyes welled up as I said, “Throw it back. I don’t want anything to do with this.” 

Looking around our property, it was hardly recognizable. We once had a spot we called “the forest” because it was so dense with trees. I loved to take our daughter over there and hunt for treasures like pretty rocks, feathers, and pinecones. Most of the trees were now burned beyond saving. Glancing over at the chicken coop, we dreaded opening it up to a horrible stench of dead birds. But as he approached it, Lane called back to me, “They’re alive! I can hear them!”

To be continued…