October 13, 1987; 5:33 AM CDT:
It wasn’t quite my typical work day in Houston. I always got up early. But this particular morning, when the alarm went off, I didn’t hit the snooze. I had an early morning meeting at work and wanted to get to work early.
So, at 5:33 AM I had already showered and was getting dressed. I wasn’t quite finished as I was actually putting on panty hose at 5:33 AM. (Anyone remember panty hose? Haven’t worn them in many years now.)
As I’m getting dressed, though, someone knocks at the door. I live in a bizarre apartment complex, so my first thought is it is someone at the wrong door. Still, I check and it is really my co-worker Janice. She’s already leaving for work and she noticed flames on the patio below me. So she’s pounding on my door to let me know. I let her in while I look for my robe. I grab slippers and robe, and without consciously thinking about it I also grab my reading glasses and purse. I’m babysitting another co-workers cat so I try to find Max. But he doesn’t respond so I tell him he’s on my own. Then I leave.
Janice grabbed a jacket hanging on a door knob. I grabbed very little, mostly without thinking about it. I didn’t really think of what I should grab, I only saved my life - nothing else really mattered. Ever since, I’ve never had much patience for those games where you tell the one thing you would save in a fire. Trust me, you don’t really think about any of those things.
I had told Janice to call 911 to let them know about the fire. Before I leave the apartment, I’m standing by my window that’s overlooking the balcony. I see the flames on my balcony and I remember thinking that maybe I should turn off the radio. Ha! Here’s a fire and I’m worried about the electric bill. As I look at the clock radio, I notice the window breaking and the curtains melting. I’m so out of there.
My next thought is of another co-worker, Dick. We’re supposed to car-pool to work so I call to let him know there’s a problem. To this day he will tell you how calm & collected I was during this call. Then I go and move my own car out of the way of the firemen. Dick says I was calm, but I could barely work the clutch b/c my leg was shaking so bad. (This was 20 years ago. Sometimes I think I have these 2 events reversed - the moving of the car and the phone call. Who can say for sure? Either way, they both happened.)
The rest of the morning was incredibly foggy and incredibly long. The fire dept was volunteer and I can’t honestly say how long it took them, except that it seemed twice as long as it really was. I wind up borrowing ill-fitting clothes from Janice. I never made it to my morning meeting, or to work for that matter. Neither did Dick. I was in no shape to drag myself out shopping for clothes and everything else. For a while at least, I literally had only the clothes on my back. And they’re borrowed!
So, of course, we went to the mall. I happened on a suit sale at JC Penney’s. (These were the days of suits for work.) All suits over $100 were xx % off. (I forget now - it was like 10 or 20 %.) A couple of suits I found were actually priced at $99 (they had slight flaws) and the sales lady (angel?) helping us actually marked them up $1 so that she could give me the sale price. Bless her heart, she even gave me all the hangers for both the suits and the blouses I bought. Not everyone thinks of that, but when you lose everything, that includes the coat hangers.
I bought a lot that day - suits, blouses, undies, shoes, purse, make-up, shampoo, toothbrush, toothpaste, etc. You know - think of all the things you use every day and take for granted. I didn’t have them. At least I had the good sense to grab my purse and so had my check book!
In many ways, it was the worst day of my life. I literally lost better than 95% of everything I owned. (There were some things in the apartment that survived both fire and water damage.) But I came out with the only part that mattered - my life.
Yet I learned a lot about what really mattered - and it wasn’t possessions. My co-worker Dick let me camp in his second bedroom until I could get a place of my own again. Most people at work were very understanding. I was one of the lucky apartment dwellers that had insurance. I spent hours and hours filling out forms. Try this sometime: Sit down and try to list EVERYTHING you own solely from memory. Good luck. When you have it all listed, including what, where bought, when bought and for how much; then list the REPLACEMENT price. Not what you paid, but what it would cost to buy it today. No cheating - you can’t go to your house or apartment to double check it! It’s a lot of work. I spent hours at the mall just getting replacement costs. (Recall that in 1987 you didn’t have an internet to search - talk about dark ages!)
I asked my boss if I could work half time while I went through all this. Reality was that it had a huge emotional impact. He agreed to half days, and paid me for full days. So I worked mornings and then hit the malls in the afternoon. After some time, my boss asked me when I would be back full time. I looked at him, smiled, and said “Two days ago.” Just shows that if you trust your employees, you get trust back.
Twenty years have passed since then. And I still own a lot of the things I bought soon after that fire. Such as the couch that I sit on while I write this. And I still have a lot of memories from that time; as well as a different perspective on a lot of things. Most importantly, that co-worker Dick is still a part of my life. In fact, since 1993 we’ve been much more than friends. We even formalized everything by getting married in 2002.
A fire was a huge impact on my life. There was a long period of time where I felt that I couldn’t ever go through something like that again. In retrospect, I’ve gone through some other rough things since then. Sister Teresa is the one that said “I know God won’t ever give me more than I can handle, I just wish he didn’t trust me so much.” Some people misunderstand that and think it means that God doesn’t challenge you. But he does. And he gives you more than you think you can handle; but not more than he knows you can handle. Always testing and showing you that you can handle much more than you thought possible.
Email This Post
