And just like that, it's all removed.

Last week FEMA brought their tractors, their diggers, their earth movers, their dump trucks, and whatever piece of machinery they could bring, and removed everything.

I told Mike I didn't want to be there when this happened. It would be too hard and too emotional.

The last time I was home, which was about a month ago, I saw people on my property identifying toxins. I wanted to go over and yell "get off my property," even though I knew they were there to help move us forward.

But after I thought about it I was curious, what does this process look like, are they being gentle as they remove our belongings, or are they just ravaging the property, like I had envisioned. So I asked Mike if he would send me photos.

"Are you sure" he asked.
"yes"
"Ok, but don't open the text until we're on the phone together." I love how my husband is always protecting me.

When I heard the ding of my phone indicating I received a text, I held my breath, called Mike, then opened the text and photo he sent. At first it looked like they were scraping our property willy nilly. But Mike assured me the backhoe operator was being very careful, and was good at his job.

"He swings his bucket so gently just like it was an extension of his own hand."

He sent me a video of the backhoe operator and in it you can hear Mike and the onsite supervisor talking as they stood watching from the street .

"It was going to be our forever home, it was home."
"well, now you get a new one, and it'll be exactly the way you want it.”

The onsite supervisor was a farm kid from Fresno, dressed in his cowboy boots and hat. They were talking about his daughters 4th birthday coming up and the birthday party she wants to have. The supervisor was very kind, caring and answered any and all questions Mike had, how was the quality construction of the garage foundation, why do you think they used such an excessive amount of cement when they built the front porch, and what will happen with the debris they are removing.

He put Mike at ease which Mike, in turn, eased my feelings about what's happening as we talked on the phone later that day.


And now we get to build a new home, and it'll be exactly the way we want it.