Surviving Wildfires, Part 3 of 4

Christian lives in Amarillo, TX. She's also one of my wife’s best friends. For the past couple weeks, the area’s been just crushed by wildfires. Last week, she and her husband were forced to evacuate their home with flames devouring their neighborhood. Their story will be shared here in four installments over the next four days. It's a lens through which to view a bigger tragedy ... and through which to find something unbelievable in such a time as this: Joy. 

Surviving Wildfires | Part 3 of 4
by Christian Bressler, as told to Brandon Sneed

Halfway back to Lake Tanglewood, my phone rang. Grandpa.

“I’m home.”

“What?” I shrieked. “How? Is your house okay?”

It was a miracle, Grandpa said, but yes, his house was fine.

I decided we had to see it for ourselves. Grandpa told us about a gate behind the neighborhood, hidden away in the middle of nowhere. It was usually locked,  but it was open for all the emergency vehicles. He had let himself in. We would do the same.

Lake Tanglewood is in a canyon, surrounded by bluffs. The fire had been in the northwest; we were driving in from the south. And even still, driving in, we saw black spots where grass had once been.

When we pulled up to Grandpa’s house, we were stunned. Black covered everything, but the house stood. The grass was even still alive in the yard. Firemen were there, so instead of stopping to talk just yet, we decided to keep going. To see our house, or what might be left of it. Nobody had mentioned it yet, and that made us nervous.

We had to go see.

Like I said earlier, we had gotten peace about what we might find. But seeing Grandpa’s house still standing gave us hope. 

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This is part of a serial story. For all blog entries telling this story, click here.