ST. AUGUSTINE RECORD EDITORIAL: We will rebuild and forever be stronger

Has it really been nine days? For those of us with severe damage, the first two days seemed like six.

Now they’re a blur.

Some could argue, we suppose, but three feet of water and slick brown mud flushing through a house may be as difficult to deal with as an outright blow-down.

But that’s just the house.

In either case, the damage to the home becomes so much more insidious, so heartbreaking.

As so many have learned this week, this isn’t about sticks and bricks.

This is about your grandmother’s cedar chest, or the quilt she sewed with arthritic fingers, and the knick-knacks you remember sitting dustless on her shelves.

This is a family photo album. You cringe, and maybe cry, trying to pry the saturated pages apart with so much care — only to rip Kodachrome memories asunder in the process.

This is looking at that doorjamb where you marked the growth spurts of the kids with a ruler and a No. 2 pencil. If you’re lucky the trim has been torn down and hauled out to the street. Maybe you trace imaginary lines with your fingernail across moldy sheet rock — a foot above the greasy waterline on the wall.

Everything smells: the mud, the mold, and the damp waft of wet pink insulation. White sheetrock dust turns the mud-stained tile floors tan.

Nothing is easy. Nothing goes fast. Traffic snarls on each trip to Ace Hardware or Home Depot; maybe not really that bad, but your nerves are frayed and naked. And you’re tired. And you realize now how long this is going to go on, and you wonder if it ever gets easier — like a loved one lost.

And you will hear stories, so many stories. You might stand in line at the McDonald’s and hear Hazel talking about living in a Red Cross Shelter, or from the young girl in line at the bank, laughing about heating bottled water in a borrowed microwave to wash her hair.

Neighbors help neighbors get through. One story is about a man down the street from a gutted home, helping drag out wet rugs and furniture while his home and that of his parents on the same street were just as bad. But their homes were two-story, he figured — meaning they had another level of life and the lower floor could wait a while.

We’d like to use this space to tell you that it’s not as bad as it seems. It is probably worse.

While the fragility of so much is achingly apparent from Ponte Vedra Beach, south to Summer Haven and west to the swollen St. Johns, we do believe one thing: We are formidable, too.

The County, City and Beach are all working hard to provide comfort and aid to those affected. The response from neighboring counties and states is truly touching.

But the defeat of misfortune during this massive effort ahead will balance on the fulcrum of friendship and commonality. We’ll learn much in the process, not the least of which is what it means to come from “rich” places of real comfort to level ground with the homeless.

People will pull us out of this.

There are so many stories to tell out there that demonstrate hope, help and resolve. The Record is putting together a compilation of your experiences. We ask for yours. Send submission, photos too, to jim.sutton@staugustine.com. Or mail it to The Record, One News Place, St. Augustine FL 32086.

Sharing is a proven way to help.

And heal.