The Nashville Flood As Seen By Jas Patrick

Floods… Meh.  No big deal.  I can swim, not like it would be scary or anything.  I don’t see what the big deal could  possibly be about floods.

Yeah… Was I am dumbass or what?

I’ve put off writing about this because I honestly didn’t know what to say and it STILL hasn’t ended; not for me, not for a lot of people.  This was a bad time, my friends and there are still a lot of people living in shelters as I type.  A lot of bad happened.

I can only say I got of lucky and wish those other people the absolute best.  I cannot possibly describe their situation nor do I feel like I have the skill with the typed word to do their plight justice.

I will say, if you CAN help in some way, please do.  There are plenty of benefits going on and every little bit helps. Many thanks for listening and I will return to matters I have a right to speak about intelligently… Well… As intelligently as I am personally able.

The time line is a tad fuzzy for me as we didn’t get much sleep for a period of about 4 days; but I think the storms started on a Friday night… either that or it was early Saturday morning.

We didn’t think much of the whole thing on Saturday because there was just a little tiny bit of water collecting behind our house many many hundreds of yards away–oh, and bear in mind there is a LARGE drop-0ff behind my house; to the tune of about 15-20 feet lower than my back patio.

In fact, I was actually taking some pics and making jokes about it on facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/jaspatrick?v=photos#!/album.php?aid=30514&id=1610019810

We honestly thought, “there’s NO WAY it can keep climbing and get close to the patio.”

We were wrong.  It made it to the patio at about 8 Sunday night.  We started to get really nervous and we packed everything we had downstairs that wasn’t nailed down and absolutely FILLED the upstairs of the house.  It took about 5-6 hours and we were pretty exhausted.

All the while, as we packed, the water was inching closer and closer up the patio.  Regardless of nervousness, I was still not too terribly worried about it as there was no water in the front of the house.  I told Vicki, “as long as there’s nothing in front, it’ll have  plenty of drain-forward room before it can actually rise enough to get in the house.

Not too long after, the storm drains in front were full and began to overflow… The water began to collect in the front of the house.  We watched as the water started to flood down the street and crawl its way up our driveway.  Yeah, little bit of pee in the pants at this point, ya dig?

Okay, okay… Let’s not worry.  No biggie.  We’ve got a GOOD 3 feet from the patio to the door frame on both the front and the back–that’s a helluva lot of water.  If only it’ll stop raining!!!

And then… At around 4 or 5 in the morning… It did!  The damn rain finally stopped!!!

We breathed a shaky sigh of relief and set a little timer for 30 minutes.  We’d sit quietly on the couch and try to get some rest and wake up every little bit (30 to 45 minutes or so) to continue to measure the water level.  Incidentally, we’d been measuring the water level from 15 feet away from the patio all the way up–in other words, we’d been taking measurements for freaking hours!   I keep telling everyone, we watched the Nashville flood by the millimeter; and that’s exactly what we did.

By about 6:30 am (this is now Monday) the water appeared to have crested and stopped its rise.  The level had remained static for over an hour.  We had been glued to the local news stations and were trying to get some hard data in-between the media grilling sobbing victims about “how they felt” about losing all their shit, loved ones ACTUALLY FREAKING DYING and other inane, bestial questions designed to garner ratings and viewership rather than giving factual information that would help people trying desperately to not elevate the victim count.  Sorry, I’m bitter.  The frigging weather channel had better minute to minute coverage of USEFUL information than any of the local news stations.

Now I understand, good ratings and “good TV” are important to those channels… But for crying out loud man!  Next time, focus on the army corp of engineers and the water levels, whether the water is still rising and RESEARCHED data on what the ACTUAL levels are/where they will be!

Rant concluded…

So yeah, Monday, 6:30 am… The level had stopped rising.  We decided to get a tad of rest.  We got about 50 or so minutes when the boss man called and asked me where the hell I was.

Why, sir… I honestly don’t have a clue… From the look of things… I’m on a damn boat!

Couldn’t have gone to work if I wanted to; so obviously he had my back and all was well.  Also… I have to say… (there are some pictures, so go ahead and verify this)  There were some stunningly gorgeous moments during the wee morning hours with the sun cresting the trees and reflecting off our murky lake in the back field.  Just beautiful…

Okay, so we’re up now.  It’s Monday morning and in the hour or so since our last measurement, guess what… THE WATER HAD GONE DOWN A FEW INCHES!!!!

Oh man, we thought we were mad rocking now!

Hey baby!  Says I… Let’s get the stuff back downstairs so we don’t have it hanging over our heads.

Let’s wait.  Says she…

Meh… Says jas with a shrug.  Let it be so.

Good call Vicki… Smart girl, her…

Not long after… With clear blue skies, not a drop of rain in sight… The water started to rise.

We continued our millimeter measuring ritual and panicked then rinsed and repeated.

This went on for most of the day.

As the water crested the second step on both front and back patios/porches–easily about 2 feet up from patio–I made the call to my old man.

Hey Pop!  Ummmmmm… I’m going to need you to come get me, Vicki and the two cats.  We’re going to be drenched and smelly from the sewage water surrounding our house.  We’re also probably going to have no home for … oh, I don’t know… months?  Yeah, that’s right… I need you to come now.

And he did.

Vicki was begging me to stay.

Let’s just mop it up if it comes in!!!  We, we can use old towels and a mop and drain it down the sink!

That was before we tried to flush the toilet and the water rose instead of flushing…

There was nowhere for the water to go!

I pointed out to Vicki that the water surrounding our house was very very literally poisonous–full of shit, dead things, bacteria from hell and worse.  It posed a tremendous health risk and if the water continued to rise, we could very literally be UNABLE to get out.

Hell, at this point, for us to walk to the front of the neighborhood to get to where dad could pick us up would literally require us to scale rocks, wade through sternum deep water (on me, not Vicki–I’m 6 foot… She’s about 7 inches shorter) all the while carrying some bit of clothing and two cats in carriers–who would very likely not be pleased about this.

Vicki, bless her heart, was just trying to be the trooper… What if the water only SLIGHTLY came in and a good wipe up job could save our BRAND NEW HARD WOOD FLOORS WE HAD JUST INSTALLED A MONTH EARLIER?!!

Yeah, no kidding… We had just remodeled out house. Freaking luck, right?

We went back and forth, forth and back and then a few side roads.

What to do…

Then we heard the yell.

ANYBODY IN THERE?

Well, yeah… We are.  Who the hell are you?

Why… it’s a man in a boat in my front yard!  Hello boat-boy!  Doing some fishing?

Actually, I’m not being funny.  There were carp swimming along the road in our front yard–some over two feet long!  And huge turtles swimming lazily where a sidewalk used to be.

HEY!  WE’RE EVACUATING THIS NEIGHBORHOOD!

Why?

They’re gonna let more water off the dam; so we expect it to rise another 5 to 8 feet.

…

…

DAMNIT!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, friends and neighbors… The reason why the water continued to rise after the rains stopped is that there are several dams surrounding the metro Nashville area.  They were far beyond their capacity and in order to save Nashville as a whole, they had to let off waters and flood places along rivers and creeks and what not–at least that’s what we were told.  I may be slightly amiss in my details; but apparently that’s the gist of it.  Cut off a few fingers to save the hand.

One of those fingers was the Opryland hotel which is only about five minutes from my house.

Ouch says the visitor’s bureau.

So yeah… Grab a trash bag, throw some clothes in–get the cat carriers and grab two already spooked cats to take them on a boat ride.

The water continues to rise.

As we’re leaving, we pick up more people needing to be evacuated.  People we’ve never met.  Our neighbors.  You know how it goes.  I’m such a busy busy person in a busy busy life and I can’t be bothered to say hello to my neighbors… Sound familiar?  Well, it was to everyone on the block.  I can tell you this:  We ALL know each other now!  Tears, beers and stories have been shared at this point.  You know what?  They’re all really nice too!  Shame I didn’t know them earlier…

Anyway, so it takes about an hour to get to the road.  My dad has to detour all over hell and back to try to make it to our main road (which is about .5 miles from my house).  Too much flooding and pandemonium.

I’d like to take a second and point out that the people helping evacuate the entire neighborhood were off duty firemen and a couple of ordinary everyday citizens.  The on duty fire department got there a bit later–they were pretty swamped, obviously.  No pun intended… hardy harr.  These cats had been trudging through shit water all day long–since about 8:30 that morning… Bravo guys.  Pretty hard work for no pay and a serious risk to your health and safety.  We appreciate your dedication.  Thank you!

Thus… Vicki and I sat with our two cats and a trash bag full of all we had left at the time on a busy road watching cars and their occupants slow down to gawk at us.

There were so many rubber-neckers and looky-loos that emergency vehicles and relatives picking up their families couldn’t make it into the absolute only 30 feet of road that wasn’t underwater in our neighborhood.  Sigh… Listen folks… We know you’re curious.  We all are from time to time.  But for crying out Pete’s sakes… GET OUT OF THE DAMN WAY!!!!

Anyway, we sat on the guardrail with 30 or so feet of creek overflow at our backs.  Vicki’s nerves were twisted about now and I’ll never forget holding her sitting on that damn guardrail while she quietly let a few tears go.  I’ve never met a tougher person.  Ever.  That woman has nerves of steel and the heart of a lioness.  I lied and told her it would be okay.  She told me she didn’t know if she could handle losing everything–that it might just break her.  I murmured something that resembled words as it all sank in… Cars… Gone.  House… Gone.  I was literally sitting on the side of the road with all I had in the world.

I mean, sure… We had the stuff upstairs.  At LEAST we had done that, right?  I told her so… She agreed and we started to heal a little bit.  We had saved our computers, my gear, all our infrastructure… Surely, we could rebuild right?

Yes and no… Tiny Lion records would be neutered for a LONG freaking time.  No music for question mark… At least no new music.  So I started to think… Benefit for jas?

Luckily… It did not come to that; but we wouldn’t know that for another 18 or so hours.

At this moment… It was all over.  As far as we knew, we’d lost nearly everything.

Up drives dad…  He takes us to my parents’ house.  My mom fusses over us and feeds us like we’re visiting royals (thank you Mom and Dad!).  We get showers and wash the sewer-water off our legs and feet (before dinner of course).

We watch the local news and practically scream (and ACTUALLY scream at times) at the TV/local news as we are bombarded by sobbing victims and no actual information on anything that will let us know what’s happening to all we have in the world.

You have to remember… At this point, it is late Monday evening and the last full night’s sleep we had was Friday night.  We’ve had about 4-5 hours of sleep in 3 days.  Fried/frazzled/scared and desperate… Can I haz a valium?  Unfortunately, none were to be had.

We went to bed well after midnight (we’re worriers, what do you want?) and woke up around 6 am or so.

Let’s go, gotta go, can we go, yeah so when are we heading…?  We spoke to no one in particular and anyone that could hear us.  Mom continued to mother-hen us and we continued to be grateful.  We borrowed Mom’s ride and went to Lowe’s to spend over 600 bones that we didn’t have.  Fan, de-humidifier, cleaning products, you name it… ANYTHING we thought would help us to reclaim our destroyed house.

After spending hours in Lowe’s and being momma-beared by about 6 employees who had heard about our troubles (Nashville’s I mean) on the news, we made our way back to my parents’ house.  I should probably point out that my parents’ crib is about an hour north of our home and it is much higher in elevation.  We are in the valley, they are not.  They had nary a pond to be seen while everywhere around my abode looked like swampland.

Thank you to the employees and management of the Lowe’s in Springfield, TN.  You were extremely kind to two weary refugees.

We transferred our flood-battle weaponry from my mother’s ride to mi padre’s and we prepared to go see just exactly what the hell… you know what I mean?  I was numb.  Vicki was jittery.  The cats would be spending ? amount of time with grandma… All was wrong with the world.

The ride there took WAY too damn long and was entirely too damn short, if you can dig what I’m slanging at ya…  It was awful.  I imagined that it would take a ride to prison or an execution to exceed the terrible specter of dread we were being forced to deep mouth kiss the entire way there.  What an awful ride.

As we pulled into the neighborhood, we brightened a bit… There was still water but visibly lower than the chest high level we’d seen less than 20 hours ago.  Side streets lower than the main were still well under water and we crept though many a pool that was none-too-shallow from the look and sound.

Our house was nestled in the very back on the last bit of main road.  We live on a dead end road… Sigh… That’s just an unsettling thing to say.  Somebody go buy an album so it doesn’t curse me!!!

Anyway, we live at the end of the… Jesus!  There’s no way to say it, is there?

So we pulled onto the last stretch that led to our house.  Yes, water… Yes, receded… Yes, heartbeat highly irregular…

Who cares?!!!  The water went down!!!!

Give me those damn keys!  NOW!!!

Throw open the door and…

Dry.

No frigging way… Lift the towels with which we barricaded the bottom stoop… Feel it!  FEEL THAT SPOT WELL!!!

Dry.

CHECK ALL THE DOORS!!!

IF THERE BE MOISTURE, WE’LL KNOW THE CAUSE OR THY HEAD SHALL BE FORFEIT!!!!

Dry.

…

…

Mumble something resembling words… Hug Vicki… High-five Dad… Mumble something… Numb…

Dry.

May the gods bless thee and keep thy pickle perked…

IT’S

FREAKING

DRY!!!!!!

Friends… Oh my dear and glorious friends… It was dry.

The flood waters had come within 2 inches of getting into my home and destroying our brand new floors, raping our already taxed finances and killing any chance of me making another album/ANY more music in the foreseeable future.  The damage had been great; but more on that when we could focus on something other than… wha wha wha.  By the way, if thou thinketh I exaggerate… You’d be dead wrong, me bucko… It was probably LESS than 2 inches.

We hugged and laughed and started running all over the house to begin work on what needed to be done.

Water had gotten WELL into the garage and nearly made it inside.  The underneath/crawl-space was absolutely flooded.  Trash, debris, refuse and the foulest odor this side of a rhino-port-a-potty collection abounded.

We had purchased a sump pump and we set to work trying to figure out how the hell such a thing was to be operated.  Apparently, they are coated in a very toxic substance that causes cancer.  SO glad Vicki reads instruction manuals!

We got that bastard revved up and then proceeded to collect our collective thoughts to ascertain what needed to be done.  Vicki’s car, gone.  Everything on the garage, gone.  Moisture barrier, insulation and everything under the house, gone.  Water heater, gone.  Four feet of height in garage drywall, gone.  Neighborhood, gone.

Us lucky bastards!

No kidding.  We really WERE lucky.  We were one of three houses on our side of the street that did NOT get water in the house.  Let me tell you, we were feeling REALLY damn lucky.  We kept our celebration quiet and to a minimum.  Our neighbors had not been so lucky.  We felt guilty for our good fortune.  A few days later, though… As things continued to break and I started to see the price tag on the different things that had to be replaced, I started to get slightly pissed at the people who would tell me how lucky I am.

People love to do that, don’t they?

You get chopped in half… You’re just SO lucky!

Hey screw you, alright?  I got chopped in half, you goofy bastard!  But believe it or not… They’re right and you’re wrong.  Unfortunately, good fortune sometimes hurts like a mofo.  Still… I wouldn’t wish for the alternative, OBVIOUSLY–so for crying out loud, don’t hate.  I’m just being honest here… And to hell with you if you think I should dance around being happy for losing a vehicle, half my house, a ton of stuff from my garage and thousands of bones to get everything cleaned, sterilized and dry.  No, I didn’t lose everything, but I definitely felt everything I lost.

Sorry… Another rant.

Incidentally, when people go through a tragedy, no matter how slight it may seem to you or how much worse it could be… Never lecture them on feeling bummed out or for feeling HOWEVER the hell they feel.  Trust me, if you lost a damn floor mat due to a flood, you’d feel lucky it wasn’t worse; but you’d also wanna bitch when you had to go shell out some clams to get a new one.  It’s natural.  Let people feel what they feel.

Moving right along…

That, my friends and enemies, is my experience with the Nashville flood.

I could talk about how people here were going crazy that “no one” in the national press talked about it.  I could talk about how there was trash talk between New Orleans and Nashville.  I could talk about a lot of things.  But I’ll only mention a few more.

1.  I have NEVER seen more people pull together and try to help one another.  Ever.  “Do you need help?”  became such a commonplace phrase that it seemed strange that I had barely heard the words uttered outside a movie or my own relationship–Vicki and I try to help each other whenever we can.  What can I say?  We’re better than you.  (yes, I’m teasing…)

2.  Everyone around here was talking about the unbelievable disaster and how we’d never seen anything like it… Hell, I said it MANY times.  “I’ve been here for 20 years and I’ve NEVER seen anything like it!!!”  Yep… That was me.  All I needed to do was spit tobacco into a spittoon and pull at my overall straps… Yokel=me.  But here’s something interesting … I heard this, I cannot verify.  Apparently, Katrina and New Orleans was about 5 times worse.  !!!!!!!!!!!!  My God, people… I simply cannot imagine.  Now, I absolutely REFUSE to go into the politics or what they or they or they say about the matter.  Doesn’t matter.  The only thing I want to say is that I knew nothing of floods until a few weeks ago.  From this day on, my heart is with ANYONE who lives through something like this.  I am so terribly sorry for the Katrina victims and for the Nashville victims.  I know some of your pain.

3.  If you have not been affected by a flood or by a disaster… Don’t crow too loudly about how you feel about it.  Even if you’re empathizing… Don’t rend your garments, okay?  Tone it down.  If you want to do something, go volunteer.  Spend a few bones on some relief.  Go pass out water.  Just don’t freaking crow.  A pulpit jockey is ten kinds of useless in a crisis.  You wanna lead your flock?  You wanna be holy or compassionate?  Get your lazy ass out there and clean debris or write a check or two.  Helps WAY more than running your hamburger hole nonstop.  Just saying…  As I get off my own pulpit.  Yeah, yeah, I know… I’m done, damnit!

4.  Being able to swim doesn’t mean shit in a flood.  Okay, well maybe not absolute shit… But damn close.  There is(are) debris, glass and metal, snakes/turtles/fish, LOADS of bacteria and crap, no sure footing and suction from drains/sewers/etc that will grab you and pull you under in a flood.  Let me repeat… You’re walking along and suddenly you step into a hole… You are then pulled under and trapped by a storm drain.  You can’t see shit… Well, you actually CAN see shit… Shit-water, that is.  It’s sewage, you understand.  But it’s far too murky to see.  If you open your eyes under that water, it’ll sting and you’ll undoubtedly get a horrible eye infection… But that won’t matter, cause you’re locked in a vortex pulling you under.  You’re dead.  Bummer.  I’m extremely guilty of this.  I thought… Meh, no big… I can swim.  Hang out on a roof till the getting is good, then I go grab some chow at the local mercado and make my way to my folks’ house.  Easy peezy, ayup!

Bullshit.

5.  If there’s a disaster, everyone around you is completely cluster-f*cked.  REGARDLESS of whether they personally are unable to get water they will horde whatever they can find.  Supermarkets are ransacked.  Gas is gone.  If you DO have to hang out on a rooftop… Do you realize how hot it is up there?  Ask a roofer.  There’s almost literally no place hotter than a roof during the day.  Chilling on a roof doesn’t exist, homie.  You’re kidding yourself.  Walking anywhere during a flood is a study in patience, fortitude and drudgery.  You don’t want to do it if you don’t have to.  Every step is heavy, hard and takes 10 times as much energy as a normal step.  I’m sure you’re all navy seals and could survive any jungle type situation… But yeah… We’ll move on.

6.  Tetanus shots.  Also, Hep A and Hep B.  Get em.  If you play slip and slide in shit water… Get yer shots.  We did.

I’m sure there’s a lot more.  I’m just tired now.  I sat down and wrote this and it has gone on a lot longer than I expected.  I may edit as other things occur to me; but I think I covered what mattered.

End of the day… Vicki and I are very VERY lucky.  We appreciate ALL the love people who know us have shown and we thank you for reading.  I am including a link to my smugmug account with over 300 pictures of different things.  They’re not labeled or anything but you can get the gist of some of what went down.  Feel free to comment.  Share you stories.  Link your blogs.  Whatever you like.

You guys be cool and take care of yourselves and each other.  Love to you all and all my hopes to those still suffering in disasters worldwide.  Whether you believe it or not, you absolutely need your brothers and sisters around the world.  Never forget that.  If you doubt me… Then try building your own house, your own car, plant your own crops, sew your own clothes, make your own music/movies/books, fix your own appliances, cure your own diseases and talk to yourself.  If you’ve got all that covered… You sure as hell aren’t reading this blog.

Peace and love and respect.

smugmug link to all the pics:  http://jaspatrick.smugmug.com/Miscellaneous/Nashville-Flood-2010/12220115_KDzaj#870405369_M2f6w