The check in...and a lot of rambling

So I spent a good party of yesterday calling all of our homeschool support groups members. I hadnt heard via email from many of them and wanted to make sure they were good. We have reached most of them but some are still unaccounted for. I know they are either without phone service, electricity or possibly still evacuated. It is hard the not knowing. The wondering. I understand that this is what I shouldnt do as I put my trust in God but I still cant seem to help but think and worry and wonder. I am working on that. I have not been frantic which is good. In fact I dont think I was frantic the entire time except with the possibility of being 10 minutes from our hotel that we were evacuating to and my transmission dropped! I lost the power to reverse and shift to overdrive. So I have my vehicle to concern me now. Not good.

But no I think I handled the whole event for the most part without being frantic. I have never been away from my family in a hurricane... I grew up here in this big ol' state and have been runnin from hurricanes since I can remember. I have always been with my family, but for two and a half days I was only with MY immediate family although I got to talk to my mom and dad and sisters. It felt extremely weird and I felt out of place. On one hand it felt good, a weird sort of Independence thing. On the other hand I felt slightly forgotten? that is not a good description but cant really place the feeling... At one point I called to get a news update because they still had cable at this point and I just started crying. I wasnt overly upset, I think everything that was happening and the enormity of the storm and damage occurring just finally got to me and I cried. But by the end of the conversation I was fine, I felt better and have been fine since. Until today. Today, I have felt weepy. I got to see pictures of some of the devastation and I am amazed at the power of water. Things I have seen for the better part of 10 years or for my entire lifetime are gone. Gone either washed completely out to sea or left in a pile of lumber and twisted metal. It is heartbreaking... the loss of life has been so far really minimal althought I know there are many to be recovered still, but the loss of places that are landmarks of this city is very sad.

Brennan's downtown burned to the ground. This is a wonderful restaurant and my husband and I just celebrated our 11 anniversary there! My husband knows the owners and we were so saddened to see that it burned during the night while firefighters practically had to watch it happen. Kemah which I just showed yall pic of few days ago... is practically destroyed. We were just there on Labor Day! We had such a wonderful relaxed day and now it will months and month until they are able to restore and rebuild. Murdocks in Galveston, it was my absolute favorite place to be! It had recently in the past few years added on a beautiful deck with rockers and I have so many family pic of us standing on the deck our back to the gulf! It is gone, washed to sea or sitting in a pile of wood on Seawall Blvd. The San Luis, still standing but heavily damaged, we honeymooned there! I know there are just places, not homes or people and they can be rebuilt but I am still just sad...

*********I started this post yesterday but did not post. We are completely restored electricity wise and went to Walmart today. It was very crowded and there was so little on the shelfs. The grocery section is very slowly getting restocked. People were friendly though. A few restaraunts up and down Fairmont were open and VERY crowded. Still not back to normal but we are working on it.

I will post pic of what all we did during our evacuation later!

Carrie in Texas