One Bites the Dust, Another Gets Hosed

OK, maybe I shouldn't joke about it, but it has been an eventful week for us. Saturday we drove past our old house in Provo. The city bought it from us two years ago and they said they would pull it down within a few months. Two weeks ago we drove past and it was still there with the "No Tresspassing" sign in the window. But when we drove past on Saturday, things were definitely different. We pulled over to take a look. A backhoe was sitting in the middle of a pile of brick, wood and dust. It was a shock to see our first little house become a pile of rubble. There were pieces here and there that were still recognizable: the laundry room door, fence posts that Ann and I had put in, some pipes, rain gutters, and pieces of walls. Mary was traumatized. She cried for ten minutes. We have lots of memories of that place: Dad's surprise 50th birthday party, Ann locking us out of the house two hours after Little Kev was born, ice growing on our bedroom wall, remodeling the kitchen, putting in the fence. Life was easier back then, even if we were living in a condemnable house.

Then Monday morning Ann got a call from her cousin, Shelly. She asked Ann how she was doing. Ann said she was doing well and asked why. Shelly said her mother had just called from Ann's dad's house. His house had burned down! Ann called me at work, and, well, all I could think was, "Wow!" (And worry, of course. That is a worried "wow".) I just didn't know what to think.

Lynn, Ann's father, called us that evening and said he was sitting with his feet up watching television. He joked with Ann, "Well, Jeanne has been asking for an addition for a while. Now she gets a complete overhaul." That is how Lynn is. After the initial shock, he finds humor in the situation and then gets back to work. Ann and I are confident he will have a house up and done by the end of March. That is just how he is; he takes care of the problem without waiting around. There is a lesson there in that, the same lesson in Gandalf's words to Frodo when he says that everyone who lives to see hard times wishes they hadn't, then says, "But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."

The fire was a roof fire and from what we heard, didn't get down into the house all the way, but the firemen had water on the house for hours, so the house is a complete loss due to the smoke and water damage. (The "Another Gets Hosed" part of my post title should make more sense now.) Luckily, they were able to save some things from the house.

Anyhow, that's our news for the past while.