Amy went to homes on Hawthorne. Chris, Misha, Kristen, and I ended up at a home on McClure. Screens were pulled from the basement windows and brigades were formed to begin emptying all of the contents. All items were to be taken away. Let me just say, this basement was dis.gus.ting. The smell of cat urine and feces was overpowering. I was proud of my husband for jumping right in to the mix to help but sorry that he was breathing the horrid smell. People were sent out and returned in no time with face masks and gloves. This basement was covered in soda cans and cat food that had been strewn about the room--and it was moldy. We spent a couple of hours working and piling flood-soaked items, furniture, clothing, carpeting... All of sudden, as another man and I walked back from dumping a load of drywall on the road, everyone started leaving. I knew we weren't finished; I wasn't sure why we were all of a sudden in full retreat. Black mold. Apparently this house had been flooded before without any clean up taking place.
The unfortunate moment came later in the day when we found out that others from the Flood Service Crew returned to the house to help with the clean up and were not told about the black mold.
Chris had to work, so the black mold incident was a good ending point. We were home for a couple of hours and then returned to Hawthorne to help with the clean up there. It was lined with huge dumpster rollaways. They were mostly full. All of the young men and young women who had gone with Amy earlier in the day had been working hard all day long to empty out basements and fill these dumpsters.
Sunday or Monday, I can't remember which, we received word from the town of Firestone that we would have to boil water. Not my favorite thing.