The news from here in Haines is that the ground is drying out and life is returning to the new normal. School is open and the holiday parade scheduled for Saturday afternoon, Snow Dragon and all—is on, along with a candlelight vigil, prayers, and a few hymns down at the harbor parking lot afterwards. I spent 10 days and some nights volunteering with a team from the Haines Borough taking names of volunteers and sending them out to people who needed help (and the organizations who could help them and lots of people doing way more than I was from Chuck and his helpers at the American Legion and Captain Kevin and the troops at Salvation Army to the road crews of handy residents and pros at the town and tribal public works departments.)
I worked with one part of my heart and most of my brain, while two of my granddaughters ran up and down the stairs past my office, took bubble baths in the daytime and asked if there was another bag of sugar for the brownies (yes, in the bottom drawer below the mixer.)
My daughter Sarah and her family and my sister and her husband and their dogs all stayed here because their homes on a hillside were threatened. My dad (87) has been visiting from New York for two months now, to keep him safe from Covid. He also has some balance and memory issues, but don’t tell him I told you that. He asked us to turn down the radio so he could nap, but we didn’t want to miss Mayor Olerud’s next announcement.
Haines is still broken, but bandaged up, and on the mend. The slope above the Beach Road neighborhood is not stable and no one can return to homes or to the roadhouse there. It’s uncertain what will happen.
All week every time the phone rang, I heard a version of “I’m okay, compared to everyone else, but not okay, you know?” from just about everyone, even people whose places were flooded. Over all of the busy-ness and worry there hangs the heavy sadness of losing two really great young people. Cheerful world adventurer and lately director of the Haines Economic Development Council David Simmons (30) and life-long resident and brand new kindergarten teacher Jenae Larson (23) died in the landslide on Beach Road. Now the experts say the extreme weather event, 10-12 inches of rain on top of feet of snow that triggered the destruction, was a once in a 200-500 year occurrence. Sort of like the pandemic, I suppose.
My heart feels like it’s being held in place with duct tape and even then it keeps falling on the floor. And yet, I feel silly saying that because so many people have it so much worse. The powers that be are transitioning from the emergency response to the phase where they figure what can be saved and what can’t and how to pay for it. You may help by contributing to the Chilkat Valley Community Foundation fund that I have provided the link to. It’s local, established, organized and secure. I am a founding member. (This is not a pitch, but because you have asked me what you can do, an opportunity.)
I’m sorry I can’t write this all better, right now, but I’m weary.
The one true thing I know is this: Haines is going to be okay because we are willing it so, and working hard, and taking very good care of each other. There’s that, and the rain finally stopped and it’s cold again. There is ice on the puddles. The stars are all out. Rebecca is even playing “Holly Jolly Christmas” on the radio.
I can’t believe it is almost Christmas. When Sarah and the girls left yesterday (they were the last to leave as it felt so good to be all together in the house) I cried because my town is in a shambles and there are people here that are homeless right now and hurting, and because of Jenae and David, and because the damn Covid hasn’t gone away, and we won’t gather around the table for a big family meal again until… I don’t know. Spring? Or an earthquake?
Still. We are lucky, and as Mr. Rogers’ mother told him, and my daughter reminded my grand daughters, when bad things happen, look for the helpers. Haines is rich in helpers. There are hundreds of them. I am sure, because I know their names, and have lists of what they have been doing all over my house.
Annette and her neighbors have even managed to string Christmas lights on all the old buildings in Fort Seward. It’s nice to see them in the darkness.