What Would You Take?

On the way to lunch Paul and I were talking about an Air Force family, stationed in Colorado Springs (which is where we are trying to go next year) who were out of town for the day and returned home to find they had no home. Their home and car had been destroyed by the fire raging through CO right now. This is a picture of their street.

And we started talking about how, while it's devastating, they are blessed to be a military family because the AF will help them, their squadron will help (and are already collecting funds and gift cards as I write), and how they probably have good insurance, and of course and most important that they are alive and healthy. Paul was saying how if the fire was started in a natural way your insurance won't necessarily cover it because it's a natural disaster. How could you possibly start over without insurance? Terrifying.

Anyways, we talked about what we would grab if we had to evacuate our home and it really got me thinking.

We decided we'd get Emma (duh), the dogs, Emma's lovie (Paul said he'd run back into a burning building for that lol), the computers because our pictures are on them, the cd's with the rest of the pictures, his dad's American flag from his funeral, his and his dad's basic training books, a suitcase with some clothes, some autographed football stuff (Paul, not me), some of Em's toys from her crib so she can have familiar things, and my memory boxes that have cards from clients and things from dating Paul. Looking around right now I realize that there's nothing that can't be replaced as long as we are together.

People have such strong ties to their homes. The items in a home represent so many things-memories, success, hard work, family, but at the end of the day they are just things. Being safe and healthy is what's most important.

And I wonder, if you had to evacuate, what would you grab?