Tornado Relief

A couple weekends ago my husband and I went and helped with tornado relief in Moore, OK.  The devastation you see on T.V. is remarkable, but once you see it in person, it's even more unreal.  Growing up in Oklahoma, I've been close to large tornadoes like this before and even gone and seen the massive messes they leave behind. But this was the first time I actually put on my own gloves and got out there to help those who were affected personally by the storm.  It puts a whole new perspective on what these people went through that horrific afternoon. 

We helped through a group named "Samaritans Purse."  It is a christian based disaster relief team that works all across the nation in events such as this.  Amazing organization. This particular day we helped clean up a large lot of land that had been already picked up and cleared out for the most part but we were helping get all the remaining debris removed so that it would be ready for this family to rebuild as soon as possible. Most are not that lucky because their homes are in neighborhoods and it will take MONTHS before they can even get all the homes cleaned up, let alone even thinking about rebuilding.  

We were actually able to meet the homeowners from this land but we were only told so little about them.  Mainly they described the afternoon of the storm and what it felt/sounded like from within their storm shelter underground.  But sifting through all the debris behind where their home once was, much more of their story could unfold.  For one, we could clearly tell they had grandchildren as many items belonging to small children were found.  Among them were sandbox toys, buzz lightyear slippers and a wizard of oz tin filled with figurines that you see below.  We also could tell somebody must have had quite the baseball card collection as many were found.  You don't think about the things flying through the air at 100+ mph like a saw blade and kitchen knife like we picked out of the ground either. 

Once we were "finished" with our work at the property we'd been at all day, we headed over to the location where Plaza Towers Elementary was once located.  The memorial they have created for those who lost their lives at the school that day is beautiful.  You can't help but mourn for those families who lost their little ones.  To think that on the day of the storm, only several hours earlier they had just been sending their child off to school like any other normal day, only to have their lives completely flipped around.  It's heart wrenching. 

In the neighborhood across from the elementary school

Since making this trip to Moore, Kinsleigh has asked so much about tornados.  What they do...what they look like.  She even talks about what she could do to make a little girl feel better who lost all her toys.  Not only that but she has added "tornado worker" to her list of things she wants to be when she grows up.  She refers to what we did as "Mommy and Daddy are going to clean up the tornado mess" and she actually requests to do the same.  She prays for these people at night. It's remarkable.  The experience of going to Moore was one that I don't want to quickly downplay and forget.  It was eye opening for me and it was another incredible lesson to my 4 year old of what it means to have compassion for others.  My things are just things and they just don't seem as important to me as they once were.  I'm trying to remind myself of this daily so I can stop focusing on the things I want to GET and instead refocus my mind on what I can GIVE.  Only God knows the capacity of which I have to offer and I can't wait for Him to show me what that is. I can't wait to go out and do something like this again. I hope what actually seemed like a small amount of work in the whole scheme of things was as big of a blessing to someone else as it was to me.