Last Tuesday, in the middle of the night, my neighbor's house burned down.
I live in a forest area, and the house that burned was an empty vacation home. We don't know yet why it burned, but my husband and I were awakened by wild banging on the door by a neighbor's visitor who just happened to have been awake to see flames. I opened the door, half asleep, to see Hell outside. Ever see a pine tree burn? Takes about a minute, and that minute is one big 40' flash-flame. Several trees were going, the vacation home was full afire, and my house was next in line. The roar of flames was bogglingly loud, burned walls were crashing down, the burning trees were popping and sparking all over the place, big fat clumps of hot ash were raining down—I went from half asleep to terrified so fast I my knees buckled and I almost fell on the floor.
First things first: I threw on a pair of jeans and my snow boots. My husband is in a wheelchair, so I got him out, grabbed our prepared evac materials and important papers near the door, and managed to find one of our two cats. Then, with the help of a brave neighbor who already had a hose going, trying to keep the side of our house from catching fire, I got our truck out of the way and to safety. Then I put all our stuff in the truck and remained ready to help my husband in and flee if the wind changed direction (it was windy, but thankfully blowing away from our house at that moment). I've personally witnessed how fast a house can catch fire if the wind changes direction—mere seconds.
I expected to see our house simply fry that night. I thought it was all over. The terror cannot be described. I'd only gotten one of our two cats out, so I was crying about my other kitty, Sabby. I couldn't stop my imagination from conjuring up the most horrific images of what would happen to her. And my turtle. At least I'd managed to grab my heavy iMac and haul it out—hey, my entire writing career is on that thing. I'd wanted to get my husband's iMac, too, for the same reason, but there wasn't enough time.
As you might guess, our house didn't burn down. We have the best firemen in the world, and they got it under control quickly. Our house ended up with minor damage, but we're okay—well, except for some smoke damage to my lungs when I got our truck, which had been close to the flames.
I cannot stress enough how important it is to have a home emergency evac plan and to practice it. I cannot stress enough how important it is to keep warm heavy clothes, good sturdy shoes, your cell phone, glasses, purse, keys, etc., right next to your bed every single night. I cannot stress enough how important it is to have dog and cat carriers ready and by the door, to have containers ready for any other more unusual pets there, too. And it might be a darn good idea to have a line of fire extinguishers from your bed to the nearest exit so that you can blast your way through if you need to. If that neighbor's friend hadn't awakened us, we might have woken up in a sea of flames. We have extinguishers placed throughout our house, but it still could have gone oh so wrong.
Don't screw around, people. It's the season of Xmas trees catching fire, y'know?
I'm still shaking today, and as far as I'm concerned, Xmas can go hang itself by its privates (Xmas is my birthday, too—happy freakin' birthday to me). I'm going to hide in my house and be with my husband and both cats and turtle, and I'm going to try to get my heartbeat under control by New Years. Luckily, I have novels to write, so I have the perfect activity to keep my evil imagination from going in bad directions.
Don't take chances, people. Keep safe. Be happy.
theartofmadeline
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