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| Devastation of fire on our property in Idaho |
Fire
I have been
thinking a lot lately about Tender Mercies and I remember the rip roaring fire
we experienced in Idaho at our cabin. It
consumed hundreds of acres and everything was charcoal black for miles
and miles.
I was in an early
morning meeting at the church as the Relief Society president when a knock came
to the Bishop’s door. It was my husband
John, I knew immediately something was wrong
or he would never interrupt a meeting at the church. He motioned for me and I promptly left. He said our cabin was burned and we needed to
go up and secure what was left.
We rode up there
with some of our children that lived in the area and it was the most sickening
feeling ever. For miles and miles before
our property everything was black. When
we approached our property even our mailbox was burnt to the ground. I have never witnessed such devastation first- hand and close up before.
Our cabin is
quite a ways off the road and secluded so we couldn’t immediately see the
damage. When we turned the last corner
we could see the cabin still standing with the porch burnt and the front doors
burnt and part of the floor in the great room.
The man from the
fire force met us there and told us his side of the story:
There had been a
fire the evening before that was started, they presumed, from the electrical
plant several miles away. He was on the
crew that was trying to save homes . He
had started digging a fire ring around our home and fire repellent had been sprayed from a plane had been sprayed from a plane from above. The wind kicked up and his boss said “forget that cabin because no one lives there, it
is only used part-time." He went to leave to
get the next property and he saw the children’s large plastic jungle gym and
felt sorry for our grandkids so he completed the fire ring and then hurried to
the farm a mile ahead. As he looked back
at the cabin on his way out of our driveway he saw a big fireball jump the fire line
and it looked to him that it was consuming the cabin. After his day’s work he reported to the paper
that our cabin was lost.
The next morning
he felt impressed to drive up to our property to see if there was anything
left. He was shocked to see the cabin
still standing. He saw it all being
consumed with his own eyes the evening before. However when
he stepped out of his truck he noticed that our wooden porch had just started
on fire and was burning the front door. He quickly
grabbed his portable fire extinguisher and busted open the door and put out the
fire. The cabin was full of smoke and he
opened all the windows and threw outside about a 5 foot square of burnt wooden
floors. Then he saw our phone number and
called us.
As amazing as all
that was I found another tender mercy……I had two special areas on the property
where I had put hammocks up and they were surrounded by trees. I called them “my secret gardens”. I loved to
go there to think, be alone and meditate, write in my journal and pray. When the TV and the noise level reached a
decibel I couldn’t handle I would gather my pencil and paper together and go
there. Only a few grandchildren even
knew where they were because they were quite hidden. I was surprised when we went to see the remains of my special areas that the hammocks
were both still standing and the two trees holding them up were not burned and
there was green grass underneath them while everything for miles around were charred.
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| Fire fighter that saved our cabin twice |
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