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By Marie Harrison 

For the Clemmons Courier

The devastation shown from Hurricane Helene on the news is almost unfathomable — Rivers where roads used to be, entire neighborhoods and towns completely cut off from the outside world with no way to communicate, so many homes and lives destroyed forever.

Thankfully, there are many who want to help, yet they feel powerless and simply don’t know what to do in the face of such complete loss. As someone who has lived through a catastrophic event, someone who knows what it is like to lose everything except for the clothes on your back, I have the unique perspective of knowing what is helpful.

During May of my senior year of high school I came home one afternoon, completely exhausted from weeks of staying up late studying for AP exams. I laid down to take a nap, anticipating another late night of studying, while my family sat down to eat dinner, but during the course of that dinner, our lives changed forever.

As my family ate, they noticed the sky getting darker, the wind picking up, and then my dad saw the trees in our backyard completely bending over. This was no average storm as my mom wanted to believe, this was dangerous, and so, while my mom and sister rushed to the basement, my dad came to get to me upstairs. Instantly awakened from a deep sleep by a deeper voice yelling my name frantically, I startled awake only to hear the tell-tale sound of a train whistle. There were no trains near my home, this was not a common occurrence, this sound could only mean one thing — a tornado!

As my dad and I rushed to the basement to meet the rest of our family, I’ll never forget rounding the corner of the basement steps only to look up and see the top two stories of our house being lifted off. I was thrown instantly into the huddle with my mom and sister while my dad was thrown elsewhere in the living room. 

Huddled with my head down, tightly hanging on to my mom and sister, I remember feeling the wind pulling at my back, trying to lift me up. I remember the pounding rains and hail pummeling us, and most of all, I remember the immense pressure that built up inside my head. Like a cartoon character, I could feel the pressure rising and imagined my head growing, knowing for certain I couldn’t take anymore and that my head would just simply explode!

While my head didn’t actually explode, my eardrums did finally burst from all that pressure and that was a pain like no other I have ever experienced. But then, just as quickly as the storm came, it went. The wind stopped, the hail was gone, and while we sat still huddled, holding onto one another for dear life, my mom called out to my dad. But there was no answer. She called again. No answer. We looked up and saw his body, laying lifeless on the ground, amid all the debris thrown around him. Our hearts stopped for a second and then, he came to. My dad finally answered. He was OK! My mom, called out, “Is the house, OK?,” and my dad’s response remains etched in my mind forever. “Look up,” he said, as we all did. And from the bottom of our basement, where two stories of house should be layered on top, we instead saw the sky. Our house was most definitely not “OK,” it was gone. Every possession, every piece of clothing, baby pictures, artwork, china — all gone in the blink of an eye. But we were all alive and that was all that mattered.

In the aftermath, in the days and weeks following, what stood out the most was all the friends and neighbors who showed up to help. Students my dad taught, who saw our story on the news, showed up with trucks, ready and willing to help filter through the debris. Friends who offered us a place to stay, cars to drive, backpacks to use for school. Everyone showed up and gave us what they had — time, resources, and even shoulders to cry on. And I think that is the greatest lesson I learned from such a tragedy — just show up. In whatever way you can, show up and be the hands and feet of Jesus, giving what you can, however you can, to help someone else in need. None of us knows when we will need help, we certainly never expected to lose everything in a tornado, but one thing is certain — in this life we will all need one another at some point. And when the time comes, show up. Show up with food, show up with water, show up with hands ready to work, just show up. Because it’s only through showing up that we are able to show Jesus to the world.