Sunday, October 11, 2009

You can't go home again.

Today we drove down to Galveston. It was the first time that we have been there since Hurricane Ike went through last year. Considering the terrible flooding and wind damage, the island on the whole looked better than I had anticipated. What looked much, much worse than I had anticipated was my old home where I grew up. After Hurricane Carla, my parents raised the house 5 feet on concrete blocks and I had hoped that this would have protected it. But it did not. The house is gutted and abandoned with windows open and siding sagging. I haven't lived there in over 30 years but it was like a punch in the stomach to see it like that. There were several houses which were in the process of being raised and several others that were in the same shape as my old house. Poor house, I hope someone comes to buy it and love it back to life but it won't be me--after Carla, I made up my mind that I will never live right on the coast again.
We drove around and saw many of the old familiar sights. The island is being re-built and is coming back to life... until the next big storm.

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