Homelessness

Floods are horrible because of the absence of insurance. Many families lost their homes in NH (and certainly in LA and MS) and had no flood insurance. Even if they did, the amount they would receive would not come close to replacing some of the more expensive homes. We saw many homes in NH that were destroyed. Some of these homes were worth well over $100,000. Numerous homes were owned by retirees. Imagine the psychological strength necessary to carry on.

It's true. These families took a risk living on a beautiful location near a river. Most probably could have taken flood insurance that would not have replaced their homes. When you take your chances, sometimes you lose. Sometimes we have to pay the cost of willingly taking a risk.

This reasoning may make others feel smug and righteous. The price in heartache and heartbreak these families are now paying is very high, maybe unbearably high. Each of us is probably one or two disasters away from homelessness, disasters unforeseen. Each setback could be managed alone. But their convergence could be devastating. Lose your job and your bank fails. Lose your job and your home is flooded. Severe legal problems that drain your account and a spouse dies. Any single disaster can be terrible. Taken together, they can become a volatile mix that is devastating.

Working as a Red Cross caseworker with families facing this immense stress can be quite frustrating. Our help seems so insignificant. Two sets of clothes, food for a week, a motel stay for a week, a little tiny bit of help in funding home repair if that makes the home livable. Not much. Maybe the greatest value of that service is it’s symbolic value. There is nothing impersonal about the Red Cross. We are the caring outreach of one’s neighbors. I have talked about the power of the ARC brand in this Blog. What we do may seem insignificant because on paper it may seem that way. But for that family, at that moment in time, it represents something powerful: caring and hope.