The Experiment – A 365 Day Search For Happiness

At a little after 7 this morning as I was heading out the front door with the dogs to walk them a huge white truck pulled up in front of my house, and then one, two, three more trucks. The man driving the big white truck rolled down his window and I asked him if they were from the city. The giant pines in my yard along the road had branches dangling dangerously into the street and they had come to take them down. No, it wasn’t the city, it was FEMA.

It is a fascinating thing to watch them work because as a number of men and women poured out of the other trucks they walked up and down the area in front of my house. They were pointing at things and hollering back and forth to one another. Apparently there are the guys who run the trucks and cut down the dangerous pieces of hanging trees but they can’t do anything until the FEMA people look at everything and tell them what they are allowed to cut. And it’s not some of the things you might like them to cut, only what is in danger of falling in the street and impeding traffic or making it dangerous to drive. But I had another problem. A huge pine, these pines grow way high into the sky as you will see below, had gigantic limbs dangling down over my driveway. The rules are they cannot come onto your property to cut anything, only along the road, but they deemed the dangling branches so dangerous over my driveway one of the men said if the branch fell it could kill someone or crush a car. When they were done cutting along the street they backed into my driveway and cut down the huge hanging limbs. In the picture above they had cut down most of it. I wish I had had the presence of mind to take a video but it was very early, I hadn’t been expecting them, and frankly was just kind of shocked by it all. I so deeply appreciated them taking down the limbs over my driveway because it hadn’t been safe for the dogs and I to walk out there.

Here is what the pines look like in my front yard and there are several of them and they are close to my house and could have fallen on it. A number of them need to come down and these are my responsibility but it is very expensive to take even one down so what will happen with them I’ve yet to figure out.

I came back inside after they left feeling so overwhelmed with gratitude I barely knew what to do with myself and then the doorbell rang. It was Drew from Port City Proud a volunteer organization that is helping people all over town. I was literally stunned by the numbers of cars that pulled up and the people who just filled my yard with rakes and wheel barrows and tarps. I didn’t have the presence of mind to photograph them before they started because people were talking to me and asking me questions but the pictures below were them in the front and back yard as they were finished cleaning up. Giant tarps, many of them, dragged debris to the front by the curb. My beloved green gated garden which was smashed by the tree that fell against the house was broken down and carted to the front after the giant pecan tree that fell against the house was taken down just after the hurricane. (Money was raised by my dear friends Lila and Bekah who organized a GoFundMe campaign to pay to have the tree taken off the house.) This is what it looked like as they were finishing up with their amazing work today…

Many more trees need to come down but this is not work they will do, I will have to pay a tree service to do that. Here is the tree that fell on the house and the green gated fence it crushed that used to be a darling garden area. It got broken down and carted out to the road today…

More pictures of the trees down for perspective of what is being dealt with here (And you can see the giant pines towering over the house from the front. These need to be taken down and it was a miracle they didn’t fall on the house.)…

Looking out kitchen window after the hurricane…

And there was so much more, but this is enough for now.

Recovery is happening, amazing people are showing up to help, angels are appearing, and I am deeply grateful. What FEMA and Port City Proud did to help today was nothing short of miraculous. To those of you who sent donations to help take down the many trees that still need taking down, and fixing the back yard fence that trees fell through and the big double gate that is now unusable and so much more you have my undying gratitude forever. I have created a fund for repairs, especially tree removal which will be a long term process. God Bless you all.

Deepest blessings and much love. Now we just keep moving forward, one day at a time…

(Once upon a time there was a sweet green gated garden. It is but a memory now…)