Our Adventure into the Neighborhood ~

I was going to post last night after I tried to get into my neighborhood. I was emotionally exhausted, I took several Tylenol pm and finally went to sleep for several hours!! I just couldn't face even writing about what I saw last night!! The sleep that I was able to get  was ruined by the nightmares that I had. And I am afraid this will only get worse as time goes on. Okay, here goes..

I will start with , yesterday I got off from work and had to go to the FEMA office and SBA office. One thing that strikes me, is, I hear people talking all the time about how rude these guys are . I HAVEN"T experienced this at ALL. I have had nothing but GOOD things to say about all the folks I have worked with. Brian at SBA was a very talkative guy, I learned quite a bit about him and his ranch in WY. Kitty  in Mitigation is from Plymouth, MA and she loves wine, she and I had a good cry together, when she was warning me exactly what I would be seeing at my house and preparing me for how bad it is going to be. I felt like we were old friends when our appointment was over. Dan was a sweet heart, and Gary was too! So.. while this is a horrible experience, these guys have done their best to make me feel a "little better"!! I learned that since there are no hotel rooms in Minot, these guys are driving every morning and night to Bismarck to stay at hotels! That makes each day about 15-16 hours long  with the commute.

I purchased my rubber boots and I was very surprised when I found my self in traffic, (just trying to go through the Kmart parking lot  as a short cut) and there they were, they opened my door and said "how many do you need"? I asked " How many what"? They said, "we have a clean up kit for you, how many do you need"? Wow.. I was just trying to take a short cut! They threw all of this stuff in my car and shut the door. I wasn't sure exactly what I had been given.. until I got home. I was very thankful to The Red Cross for this clean up kit!!  It has stuff in it I would never have thought of! I never thought in my wildest dreams that I would ever have the need for The Red Cross! What a great organization.. I will remember this when it's time to donate money in the future, and I highly encourage everyone to make a donation to your local chapter!! You never know when a disaster will hit your area!! Think about it!!

So, with a clean up kit in my car Amy and I set off to see how close we can get to my house, our first bet was go North Hill and then back track to 8th  Street and see if we can get over the 6th Street bridge. That bridge is open and we thought okay.. we will be two blocks from my house WRONG...  We were right beside The Dakota Rose Bed and Breakfast, a place that Amy and I know well. Erika had her 9th Birthday party here, with a formal tea with her friends, it was a way for young ladies to dress up and learn proper etiquette, while at the same time enjoying themselves. Erika loved every moment and felt like a "grown up". Amy on the other hand, had the most wonderful day of her life here.  Amy and Lee had a lovely outdoor wedding at this location.  By the way, since Amy (my 25 year old daughter) was about ten years old, she had always told me, "One day mommy, I will get married right there". And she did!!  For my friends out of state, to catch you up,The Dakota Rose B&B  is a beautiful Victorian  mansion, with beautiful breath taking grounds. Yesterday, we saw the exact location on the property where Amy and Lee took their vows, and  my sweet Amy fell completely apart!! As I just stated, Amy has loved this place since she was a little girl!! It's only two blocks from our house, and Amy would beg me to drive by so she could see it!! What great memories for the two of us!! But, last night we stood on that bridge and cried together remembering her beautiful day and knowing that it will NEVER be the same again!! My "little girl" is heart was broken and the anguish on her beautiful face will be a permanent memory in my mind as long as I live.

After a good cry, we pulled ourselves together, and realized obviously, we couldn't get through due to the amount of water in this low area, I received a phone call from my neighbor Donna and we discussed what route I could possibly take.  Amy and I battled the traffic and headed back onto Broadway , cut down on 2nd Ave and parked at the Library. Put our protective gear on, grabbed a couple of bottles of water, my camera, my phone, and a shovel and headed out over the train tracks and into the neighborhood!  We were able to get on 4th  Street and felt like we had hit pay dirt!! But what we saw was beyond anything I have ever imagined. Water is every where, the smell was far worse than I had smelled in other areas, this water isn't moving at all. The smell almost took my breath away, and this morning I can still smell that nasty, disgusting river water, this is a smell that I won't easily forget. We were extremely shocked to say the least.  I saw millions (not exaggerating)  of white long worms, clusters of these nasty things, we couldn't take one step without stepping on them.  There were minnows swimming, and  Amy saw a crawdad. There are also huge white (I think) maggots in the water.. not sure exactly what they are, but nauseating to put it mildly. I felt like I could throw up at any moment, I have never seen anything like this before.   We made our way around houses and through the 4th Street area, in this nasty water noticing exactly where the huge dike had been breached. It is very obvious that this dike was never large enough to handle this amount of water and after it was built, the city had not added any more to it to help our area.. More on this later.  I am not done with this topic YET!! 

Steamrolling ahead, We were able to get within about  80 to 100 yards from my house, again too much water, we weren't going in any further if it came to the edge of my knee high boots. I was able to see that the water has obviously receded  OFF the main floor of my house and the house of my neighbors, Dan and Cindy Griffith! As best as I could tell, it appears that we had maybe seven to nine feet of water on our main levels. Dan and Cindy have some Spruce trees next to their living room windows and the water was up half way on those trees. You can see that because the trees are dead, brown from being under so much water. I was worried that my 101 year old house was off the foundation, it appears that it isn't, but again, I only saw a small area. There is debris  every where, I found my trash can on 4th Street. There was a bicycle in a tree.  Windows are broken out of houses, MOLD is everywhere!! This was a very strong dangerous flood, and with all of the mold, we will have to be VERY careful with the way we handle things upon entering my property and house.

Amy and I were able to find the sidewalks around all of these areas, where the water wasn't as deep. But we soon realized that we can only go in so far. After me saying a few choice words, we agreed it was time to get out of there, it just wasn't safe any more.  We were bummed out that we were so close but yet so far, but we were also elated that we got as close as we did!!  As we are walking across the RR tracks,  we see what appears to be two police officers on four wheelers coming right to us. Amy said, "Mom we're going to jail".   I advised her that the city made a statement that You can not drive through water to get to your property. They DID NOT say.. you couldn't walk into the area. I have to admit though.. I thought we might be arrested and I didn't relish the thought of having handcuffs on.  These guys (Albert and Juan, yes, I got their names and they were very good looking too, I might add)  were border patrol officers from  the US/Canadian border  and were just helping out!! They asked what we were doing, they saw my shovel and wanted to know if we were working down there, I told them "no, I just wanted to see my house and that I was desperate to know something/anything about my property".  They understood, but were concerned for our safety. I almost talked them into taking us back in on the four wheelers.. but they were afraid they would get in trouble,  I definitely didn't want that. They said that they would try to get over to my street on their four wheelers and take some pictures for me. They took my camera and off they went. What great guys!! After a little while, they came back and said that they couldn't get through and that they were worried about sink holes, (a big hole in the street that just appears and all of a sudden you're in it and YOU disappear, very dangerous). I was glad they were safe, but sad that they couldn't get to my street!! We shook hands and they left without arresting us. We could see the headlines of the  Minot Daily News the next day.. "Mother and Daughter Arrested  for Going Into Unauthorized Flood Zone". We decided we had an adventure but it was time to go home. On the drive to Surrey, we must have seen four or five police cars with lights flashing. Amy was certain that they were looking for us!  I had to smile at that one.

Thanks for reading this far.. but one point that I want to make is the dike on 4th Street, remember, I said I wasn't finished with this topic. We took pictures of this thing before the flood, it was very large. But when the city knew we were NOT okay and that there was going to be far more water than we ever expected,  NOTHING was  added to this dike. I know that secondary dikes were built and the city worked 24 hours a day (my son in law was one of these guys working 12 hour days on the dikes) building these dikes up. BUT 4th Street was not touched. 4th Ave was .. but not 4th Street. Basically,  I feel like our homes were sacrificed. Seeing the dike and where it was breached, was a punch in the gut last night. I forgot to take pictures of this, I wish I had remembered, maybe later today I can get some shots and then compare the before and after. It was shocking.

  Well, I know this is long, if you read the whole thing, thank you. As my friend said in a phone call this morning, Facebook just doesn't have enough space for you to say everything you need to say. LOL ~ But, I wanted to try to explain what I saw and how this effected me and Amy. I am looking forward to getting into my house, getting the rest of my things out and then dealing with the after math of this horrible situation. It's going to be  A LOT of work, but, I am tired of sitting here  just waiting, my patience has worn out!!  My sister Lynn (from Atlanta) is coming up in two weeks to help me. It will be nice to have the support of my family right now. The final shoe has dropped, now it's time to pick it up, dust it off and try to get back to normal.. what ever the definition of normal means.

Minot friends stay strong.. we are North Dakotans we're tough!! Until next time!!  Thanks again for taking the time to read!

As Always~


Trish