Hi Sue and friends,
We are not back home yet, it is a slow process dealing with the insurance company and making sure we are doing the right thing. Various people recommended we ask another engineer to check the structure of the house due to the huge force exerted on the whole house when the roof was ripped off by the wind. We received his report last Thursday and sent it straight to the insurance company. It seems we will be getting a very thorough re-roofing of the house including new verandah and ceilings and paintwork inside and out. There has also been water damage due to heavy rains since the fires, which have caused damage to flooring and walls (and some furniture).
We thought we might have had to knock the whole house down and start again but thankfully we won't have to - we have priced rebuilding options and would have been severely out of pocket. Our insurance plus some of the recovery fund money will cover a large part of the repairs.
There is SOOOooo much paperwork!!
Our cattle have now all been agisted to suitable disease-free properties (apart from 10 young ones that need daily feeding). Bruce goes out to the farm most days to attend to those cattle and feed dogs.
Our property has not been cleared as yet - sheds and fencing that burnt down as well as the roofing iron and wooden beams. The demolition company will come in soon to attend to that and will take any other 'stuff' we want disposed of, including as much of the asbestos cement sheeting from the garage and house as we can get off safely.
So our next task is to start packing up all our belongings (and tossing out lots of junk I hope) from the house and garage for storage/disposal. A very big job.
We are staying in Cottlesbridge, which is just out of Hurstbridge, so still within our local area. I registered our family with the Dept of Human Services during the 1st or 2nd week of this time just in case we needed assistance. I'm so glad I did as we have been fortunate to be offered accommodation with a retired couple who have half a house we can use. They live in the newer part that was added to our bit some years ago and had been used for family visitors. They are a lovely couple and we can come and go quite easily without disturbing them significantly.
Well, that's all the practical stuff - the emotional is not so easily dealt with. The children have of course been hugely traumatised by all of this. Rory in particular had nightmares and has needed night-lights and a radio on, as well as the bedroom door open all night. Both have needed extensive counselling, mostly from me. They saw Di K a few times which was helpful but most of their talking comes at bedtime so I have spent many hours with both - they have wanted my ear in particular and I have found the weight of their sadness very draining at times but of course I wouldn't want to not be an active part of their grieving. Tess has felt very isolated at her secondary school and has felt unable to be herself there, so puts on a public face and then crashes at home. She has had numerous days with the Strathewen children at their temporary school in Wattle Glen and comes away feeling loved and nurtured which is fantastic for her yet at the same time it accentuates the difficulties and failings of her own school. We will be taking advantage of the counselling services/funding that has been made available as part of the recovery program.
We have had some incredibly sad times dealing with and grieving for the loss of our friends. Our whole community is dislocated, fragmented, without a centre. The land is so damaged, so ravaged. There are strange new shoots on a few trees, and a film of fluoro green across some cleared paddocks; our end of the valley is an oasis of a couple of green acres along the creek reserve, the rest is black/grey as far as the eye can see. It is very difficult still to drive out to our farm - we drive down our road and pass by so many properties where neighbours fought epic battles, some survived but many didn't. I feel the loss acutely, deeply, and painfully every day, many times every day. There are so many people gone from our lives; there are many empty spaces in what was our family's social atom.
Of course we have had some new people enter our lives since the fires and others who have re-entered after many years of absence, and we celebrate those connections. We have had some good laughs and enjoyed ourselves along the way at various functions/locations. But there is a heavy-heartedness underlying our public smiles. It is good to connect with those who have been through this time and let our guard down and confess that we're not really doing as well as we all make out. We (the community) are very aware of the need for many of us to continue to tell our stories, to piece it all together, to rise up, to fall in a heap, to be together however we are.
We are doing ok. We are getting there. But it is very hard. It is very sad. It is still quite overwhelming. I hear it has been 100 days - I'm glad someone's keeping count - for me there is a strange timelessness that doesn't really go away - sometimes it feels like days, other times it feels like years.
Tess, my daughter had to do a project to be presented orally to the class. She had to choose 10 items that meant something to her and put them in a box and then talk about them to her teachers and peers. She fell in a heap as she tried to find things to put in the box. She realised that since the fires the things she felt were important to her had changed. So I got her to write about her struggle and present that to the class. I sat with her on her bed as she wrote and re-wrote until she had the bones of it. She wrote about her best friend who is recovering in the children's hospital from very bad burns, who lost her father, mother and little sister. She wrote of her other best friend who lost her Dad that day. She wrote of losing her home as she knew it - the physical structure but also the natural environment. She wrote of her loss of her childhood school, of the small community hall where so many concerts and parties had been held. She didn't waste words, there were few embellishments. I hope she is brave enough to present it. Even if she chooses not to I know the writing of it has helped her.
There is a lot to say. There is a lot to feel. We are getting there. I have lost all my old emails with addresses and links. Again, I am slow at replying to calls/emails/letters - there is still a need to be a little protected.
Lots of love Margaret. xxx
We thought we might have had to knock the whole house down and start again but thankfully we won't have to - we have priced rebuilding options and would have been severely out of pocket. Our insurance plus some of the recovery fund money will cover a large part of the repairs.
There is SOOOooo much paperwork!!
Our cattle have now all been agisted to suitable disease-free properties (apart from 10 young ones that need daily feeding). Bruce goes out to the farm most days to attend to those cattle and feed dogs.
Our property has not been cleared as yet - sheds and fencing that burnt down as well as the roofing iron and wooden beams. The demolition company will come in soon to attend to that and will take any other 'stuff' we want disposed of, including as much of the asbestos cement sheeting from the garage and house as we can get off safely.
So our next task is to start packing up all our belongings (and tossing out lots of junk I hope) from the house and garage for storage/disposal. A very big job.
We are staying in Cottlesbridge, which is just out of Hurstbridge, so still within our local area. I registered our family with the Dept of Human Services during the 1st or 2nd week of this time just in case we needed assistance. I'm so glad I did as we have been fortunate to be offered accommodation with a retired couple who have half a house we can use. They live in the newer part that was added to our bit some years ago and had been used for family visitors. They are a lovely couple and we can come and go quite easily without disturbing them significantly.
Well, that's all the practical stuff - the emotional is not so easily dealt with. The children have of course been hugely traumatised by all of this. Rory in particular had nightmares and has needed night-lights and a radio on, as well as the bedroom door open all night. Both have needed extensive counselling, mostly from me. They saw Di K a few times which was helpful but most of their talking comes at bedtime so I have spent many hours with both - they have wanted my ear in particular and I have found the weight of their sadness very draining at times but of course I wouldn't want to not be an active part of their grieving. Tess has felt very isolated at her secondary school and has felt unable to be herself there, so puts on a public face and then crashes at home. She has had numerous days with the Strathewen children at their temporary school in Wattle Glen and comes away feeling loved and nurtured which is fantastic for her yet at the same time it accentuates the difficulties and failings of her own school. We will be taking advantage of the counselling services/funding that has been made available as part of the recovery program.
We have had some incredibly sad times dealing with and grieving for the loss of our friends. Our whole community is dislocated, fragmented, without a centre. The land is so damaged, so ravaged. There are strange new shoots on a few trees, and a film of fluoro green across some cleared paddocks; our end of the valley is an oasis of a couple of green acres along the creek reserve, the rest is black/grey as far as the eye can see. It is very difficult still to drive out to our farm - we drive down our road and pass by so many properties where neighbours fought epic battles, some survived but many didn't. I feel the loss acutely, deeply, and painfully every day, many times every day. There are so many people gone from our lives; there are many empty spaces in what was our family's social atom.
Of course we have had some new people enter our lives since the fires and others who have re-entered after many years of absence, and we celebrate those connections. We have had some good laughs and enjoyed ourselves along the way at various functions/locations. But there is a heavy-heartedness underlying our public smiles. It is good to connect with those who have been through this time and let our guard down and confess that we're not really doing as well as we all make out. We (the community) are very aware of the need for many of us to continue to tell our stories, to piece it all together, to rise up, to fall in a heap, to be together however we are.
We are doing ok. We are getting there. But it is very hard. It is very sad. It is still quite overwhelming. I hear it has been 100 days - I'm glad someone's keeping count - for me there is a strange timelessness that doesn't really go away - sometimes it feels like days, other times it feels like years.
Tess, my daughter had to do a project to be presented orally to the class. She had to choose 10 items that meant something to her and put them in a box and then talk about them to her teachers and peers. She fell in a heap as she tried to find things to put in the box. She realised that since the fires the things she felt were important to her had changed. So I got her to write about her struggle and present that to the class. I sat with her on her bed as she wrote and re-wrote until she had the bones of it. She wrote about her best friend who is recovering in the children's hospital from very bad burns, who lost her father, mother and little sister. She wrote of her other best friend who lost her Dad that day. She wrote of losing her home as she knew it - the physical structure but also the natural environment. She wrote of her loss of her childhood school, of the small community hall where so many concerts and parties had been held. She didn't waste words, there were few embellishments. I hope she is brave enough to present it. Even if she chooses not to I know the writing of it has helped her.
There is a lot to say. There is a lot to feel. We are getting there. I have lost all my old emails with addresses and links. Again, I am slow at replying to calls/emails/letters - there is still a need to be a little protected.
Lots of love Margaret. xxx
2 comments:
Kia ora Margaret - Cried an ocean reading this article of yours. So good to know how you really are. Can you hear the song I am singing for you? much love and many many good wishes for you and your dearest family xxx Katrina
Kia ora Margaret, Lethe here too, your writing is so beautiful, love to you all. Hate that you have to do all that paperwork, what an incredibly busy time with so many other poignant things to walk through every day. Neat mother. XXXXX Lethe
Hello Margaret and thanks for your letter. I felt very moved to hear what is and has been happening to you all after those fires.
What a lot you are doing! What a lot to do. One step after another. One foot after another. Equally the 'being with' Tess and Rory when they need you.
My heart goes out to you in your loss of your dear friends and neighbours and your childrens' friends:
Loving you
Holding you
Keeping you
In mind and heart
Seeing you
Feeling you
Being with you
In mind and heart
With love, Sue Daniel xxx
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