"Grandma---there is alot of smoke."

  We had a fire here in the Black Forest 2 months ago. The grass was brown, the ground was hot and dry and the trees were like kindling. We were having the hottest and driest June in recent history. The perfect recipe for a fire.

  The morning of the fire, I had been at work at the garden center. Everything there was so parched and I had been watering all morning. The wind had picked up and was blowing hot, dry air. I had decided to take some of my kids and grandkids fishing that afternoon at a nearby lake to escape the heat.

   While we were there I got a text from one of my employees that he could see smoke billowing up in the trees behind the shop. I then got a call from a family friend saying we needed to get home right away as the fire was spreading. I had 4 little kids with me and my son who is in a wheelchair. We quickly gathered up all of our fishing gear, lunches and  lawn chairs and loaded into the car.

  The lake where we were fishing is down in a hollow next to the mountains, and we could see no signs of a fire from that perspective. But as we drove up to the road to lead us home we were met with a startling sight. There was a mushroom cloud of smoke right over the Black Forest...right where our home should have been. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. It was a massive "atomic bomb" size cloud.

  With 5 kids in the car seeing all of this also, I knew my job was to keep them calm. They all were staring at this sight in front of us and none of them spoke for a minute or two. Then my littlest grandson said..."Grandma, there is alot of smoke!" Another started to cry and one tried calling his mom. A little friend of my grandson, who was along desperately tried to call his mom, then his dad to see if they were alright. We still had 15 miles to drive before we could get home, and all the while this huge cloud of smoke is straight in front of us. With soothing words, and calm answers I was able to hold it together until we pulled into the drive.

  Two of my grandsons and their friend ran to their home, and I got to our house just in time to see a wall of smoke pouring over the woods directly behind us. The fire was still quite a ways away, and we felt we had time to grab a few things.  My sweet 5 year old grandson wanted a snack....and my son in the wheelchair hopped out as quickly as he could to scoot downstairs to pack a few things as we knew we had to leave quickly.

  I propped my grandson at the counter with a box of goldfish crackers and some juice and went back to my room to grab a few clothes. I stood in the closet trying to calm my nerves and logically think what I should take with me.

  At about that time, another son, who was at the airport about ready to take off, called and offered to have 3 trucks and 10 of his employees come to help me "move my house". While they were on the way we got the mandatory evacuation call from 911. Another son showed up at about that time, and started taking pictures and home movies out to the car. By then the crew from my son's business was there as was my daughter. We started throwing things in baskets and the crew started moving furniture and pictures out to the waiting trucks.

  My grandson was still eating goldfish crackers and drinking his juice at the counter, but once the crew was here he moved out to the trampoline to watch all of the excitement. He even handed a few toys from the sandbox to one of the "moving men" to save for him!

  The men helping with the move were so kind and compassionate. One of them even came and hugged me and told me they would do anything they could to help. As we were preparing to leave, I stood in front of my 10,000 volume library and cried the first tears all day. My books! They were all going to go up in flames...such a loss. They were all my friends. I had spent so many hours with them. They had been with me for years and years and I felt like I was abandoning them. One of the guys offered to start hauling books out to the truck if that is what I wanted. But in the end , we closed the library door and walked away. That part was the hardest.

  Within 45 minutes most of my house was loaded into the waiting trucks, and we were pulling out of our drive. Our development road was clogged with bystanders watching the smoke and flames as the Black Forest burned. We had to take a back way out of the forest in order to get to my son's home in town.

  The site was scary. Hundreds of cars and trucks were pouring INTO the Black Forest to rescue children, pets or belongings. The sky was dark and the smoke was everywhere. It was very sobering.

Part 2 next time......