Predict

How will things change for Samantha?

Saturday, September 17, 2005

Going Home

I went home. But it wasn’t home. Home isn’t really there anymore.

Mud was caked everywhere on the ground. Things were brown and gray, not green as they used to be. It was like I stepped into some other reality. This wasn’t the St. Bernard I remembered.

We turned into my neighborhood, and it was strange. Usually, I see green grass, green bushes, green shrubs, and trees. Now, the salt water had killed all of those things. It was brown now, an old, dry brown.

… the smell was horrible.

Dad stopped the truck in the middle of the street, and we spilled out.

When Mom walked onto the porch and looked through the front room door, I knew she wasn’t expecting what she saw. And the smell was horrible. Mold and rotten food and mud scents mixing together.

I walked to the hall. There was mold growing everywhere on the walls. It was as if we had put up some demented circle-pattern wallpaper for fun.

My bedroom door was open, so I walked right in. Nothing was in its right place. My bed had flipped over. My bookshelf had fallen over. Papers were on my floor.

I climbed over my bed to get to the closet where my dresses had been hanging.

I was gasping for breath as I lifted a plastic bag and looked at my pink dress. It was fine, and I started yelling for my mom to come and see. My dress was fine!

As we drove away, I thought about walking around my house and seeing things that I had once treasured.

I realized that it didn’t really matter anymore, any of it. I lost papers and stories and clothes, but I’m fortunate that I didn’t lose the people that matter to me.