September 16th our friend Clark Walker drove us to the Charlotte/Douglas airport to start our adventure in disaster response to Hurricane Ike in TX.  We flew into Dallas, Tx arriving with about 12 other Red Cross Volunteers coming from different parts of eastern America.  We divided into two van loads with Chuck driving one of the vans.

We drove to the Red Cross headquarters there and began the rather confusing and frustrating process of being assigned to job.  We were to be part of what they call mass care/shelter/feeding, but as we were going from desk to desk a man representing bulk distribution grabbed most of us saying they needed help and they could provide us with a motel room for the night.  Once we agreed to be assigned to bulk distribution the motel room promise was thrown to the wayside. We were told to report to the headquarters at 5:30 the next morning to drive in a convoy to Kountze, TX.  We all piled into the vans and headed to the staff shelter close by and once we staked out our cots we drove to a near by restaurant for our “last supper”.  Chuck and I ordered fajitas for two which failed to come out when everyone else at our table got their meals.  After everyone was half finished with their food ours came out cold.  So we ended up with a freshly made late free dinner.

From the restaurant we went across to the Wal-Mart and purchased blow up mattresses with a battery operated pump to put on top of the cots. That was the best purchase we have made in a while.  We did not know at the time that we would remain in shelters until our last night of this journey.  Chuck and I tried sleeping on a cot when we were deployed to CA for the wildfires and that was a no sleep zone.

The shelter had two showers, one for women and one for men.  We got in line for a quick shower and went straight to bed.  When you sleep in a large room full of people you hear all kinds of noises at night.  I never realized that snoring is like singing, everyone has their own tone.  Even though it was inconvenient to stay in a shelter in a way it is kind of good.  You come to help people who have just been pulled out of their homes and for the most part are in shelters.  Many don’t have homes to return to so by you staying in a shelter it helps you have compassion for what they are going through.

Our first night in TX seemed short with our wake up time being 4:30 am, but sleep was better with the air mattress. We again loaded up the van and headed out to our 2 week long journey.