we had a ton of rain, and apparently a few of our pipes were cracked. hence the flood. we had no idea what to do at first. it was just so overwhelming. finally john went to the hardware store and bought a pump. there was so much water it took two days to pump it all out. then the remaining water just didn't go down the drain. that's when we had to call the plumbers and realized that we had cracked pipes. we were able to fix those outside the house, but didn't have enough money to fix the one inside. so we're living on borrowed time with that one.
the destruction was heartbreaking. all my journals got wet. i've had them since high school. i'm still trying to decide what to do about them. i aired them out a bit, but that wasn't really enough. they're outside, protected, airing out while i decide what to do with them. i can't bear the thought of throwing them out.
john and i just through out so much stuff. we had too many pieces of furniture that were made out of particle board. never again.
my entire collection of bookbinding cloth was ruined.
the cool skull cane i made last year? trashed. that desk on the left? trashed.
i had set way too much on the floor. one of those boxes contained slides from my grandmother. i was planning to mail them to my cousin for scanning.
pictures, books, papers. i was planning on organizing before this happened, so i had pulled out a lot of things and put them on the floor to sort.
we found out these rubbermaid boxes are not water tight. we lost heirlooms and john's collection of baseball cards.
a bunch of art, books and tarot cards. trashed.
this explains, in part, why you haven't heard from me in a while. also, i've been having health problems again. but i realized it was important for me to jump back on the bandwagon and give my blog some love.
Those pictures are heartbreaking - every artist's worst fear. So sorry that happened to you.
Posted by: Elissa | October 07, 2010 at 09:23 AM
yikes! Must read this in full later... poor you...
Just wanted to let you know I have a new blog Meliscellanea:
http://melissamccobbhubbell.typepad.com/meliscellanea/
and my melissamccobbhubbell.com site is back up (but needs tweaking)
Hope you are well otherwise...
Melissa
Posted by: Melissa McCobb Hubbell | October 07, 2010 at 09:59 AM
thanks melissa. i'll check out your sites. hope you are well too.
Posted by: newfry | October 07, 2010 at 04:50 PM
thanks elissa!
Posted by: newfry | October 07, 2010 at 04:52 PM
I am very sorry that this happened. I can say that I understand what you are going through somewhat, since my apartment was also flooded last month, about 4" of water...also from a malfunctioned rain pipe. The water back-washed into the apartment at 5am. There was nothing we could do. BTW, I stay on the first floor!
Posted by: Som Banerjee | October 08, 2010 at 04:22 AM
i hope you have a basement and didn't have too much damage on the first floor. isn't flooding awful?
Posted by: newfry | October 08, 2010 at 07:27 AM
Oh, your post made my heart sink. I am very sorry for your loss, I can't imagine loosing so much. I hope something positive comes of this (somehow).
Sending positive thoughts,
Randy
Posted by: Randy J. Arnold | October 09, 2010 at 07:35 PM
thanks randy. i appreciate the positive thoughts.
Posted by: newfry | October 09, 2010 at 09:04 PM
Oh Geraldine, how awful for you both! I am so sorry to hear/ see the damage done to your precious stuff. And things you've stored in plastic boxes too - that you'd expect to be protected... I hope you are able to salvage at least some of it. A horrible thing to happen. What a shame!
Posted by: Lizzie | October 13, 2010 at 10:27 AM
most of the stuff can be replaced when i have a bit of money. the
cleaning was such hard work. i'm most upset about all my journals
getting wet. i'm trying to salvage them, but i don't know if i really
can.
Posted by: newfry | October 15, 2010 at 07:03 AM