Last night, the house directly across the green belt from us was burning. I guess their chimney caught fire and thus the entire neighborhood was lit up with fire trucks. When I went outside to watch what was happening, there were 4 fire trucks, including a ladder truck and a whole slew of police cars. It was a pretty big thing for the neighborhood.
This morning when I woke the boys up for school I told them about the fire and using anything I can to motivate them to move faster, I told them we'd drive by the house if everyone was ready to go early and didn't have to have me telling them to do each and every step of getting ready. Turns out, it worked and what can only be described as nothing short of a fluke, we were all ready ahead of schedule this morning and so as promised we left in time to drive by the scene of the fire.
As we drove by and with the sun barely up, the fire crew or family who lives in the house, had already pulled a huge pile of burned items out of the house and to the curb. Looking at the house, it was clear the entire side of the house where the chimney was, was destroyed. Slowly driving by I said how sad I felt for the family as they couldn't stay in the house. Immediately Michael and Gabriel asked, "Mom, where are they living now?" I responded, "They probably stayed in a hotel last night or maybe with family." "Why mom? Why can't they stay there?" (being that the structure of the house is still in tact, I guess it was a legitimate question). "Well Gabriel, they can't stay there because of the damage done to the house. The inside is probably burned, plus smoke is inside and right now the house doesn't have any power so they wouldn't have any heat." Upon hearing my response and as they still plastered their faces to the window to take in every detail, Michael asked, "Mom will they stay in that house tonight since the fire is out?" "Probably not Michael, the house doesn't have any power and so it would be very cold. They'll have to wait until the house is repaired. And immediately Michael responded, "Mom, we should go help them. I have tools and I can fix their house." Gabriel thinking he was one step ahead said, "Michael but you can't because they don't have any heat and it would be too cold." To which Michael said, "Gabriel we can just take heat with us." "No we can't Michael, you can't take heat." Gabriel said as if Michael suggestion was completely silly. By this point we had left our neighborhood and were on our way to school. Given that it was only 35 degrees when we left the house, there was steam rising as we crossed over a water canal. Back to their conversation Michael retorted, "Gabriel yes we can take heat with us, we can just put it in a bag and carry it with our tools." Expecting Gabriel to come down hard on Michael for such a silly idea, I was waiting for his response. Being that Gabriel is the self described older and more smarter brother (only because he's older though), I was surprised when instead Gabriel was quiet. he was in thought. Just a few moment's later Gabriel started pointing to the steam coming off of the water pump near the canal and exclaimed, "That's a great idea Michael, we can just put heat in the bag, see Mom there's heat right there!"
Until next time,
Angie
No comments:
Post a Comment