Storm-weary inwinnie, they sigh and prepare again
WINNIE — Mell Williams III awoke Wednesday morning in a Hampton Inn where he and his wife had hunkered for two nights in case Beta flooded their home a third time. They lived at the hotel next door for six months afterharvey and fourmonths after Imelda. He still remembers the room number: 113.
Bands from Beta overnight passed this area by, dropping some rain but nothing the region couldn’t handle. It still had been worth it to stay at the hotel forwilliams, 73. A neighbor rescued them from their Winnie-area homeduringharvey, andthe sheriff’s department got them during Imelda. His 68-year-old wife, Wanda, hasmultiple sclerosis and cannot walk; he worried they would drown.
Williams was among those glued to the news while Beta filled roadways some 60 miles west in Houston. And though weather predictions here were not dire, he and others still worried and prepared in case heavy rain headed east next. Their actions demonstrated the lasting impact of storms on property and mental health — and they showed the strain storms cause even when they don’t hit, with concern about COVID-19 layered on too.
Williams felt safe when he got the roomreservation and knewhe wouldn’t againneed tobe rescued. But the days before the storm still were stressful, he said. At home, he stacked chairs on tables and piled belongings on the bed. Worry persisted about his idyllic red home surrounded by pasture and built to suit his wife’s needs; then therewas the potential of catching the coronavirus in a hotel, too.
“Lucky my heart is strong,” he jokedwednesday, holding a cup of coffee with creamafter packing up and getting his wife back home. (He and his wife are both retired, he from Motiva, she from teaching.)
Williams was not alone in his anxiety. The local justice of the peace, Yale Devillier, woke up only twice overnight, listening for pounding rain. But one of his clerks came in late because she stayed up worried. Devillier could understand that: He just moved back into his home two months ago after Imelda’s damage. His wife also fell sick FROMCOVID-19.
“Always something, it seems like now,” Devillier said. “Ever sinceharvey, it’sbeenonething after another forme andmy family.”
Blake Fischer, 36, was still living with his aunt and uncle in Winnie while he rebuilt in nearby Hamshire after Imelda’s floods. Muchof this neighborhood, known as Teacherville because of the teachers who live there, flooded in Imelda and Harvey too. So there was alwayssomeanxiety aroundstorms, he said.
Between the coronavirus and an especially active stormseason it had been “a double whammy for our part of the country,” Fischer said. He watched the news about Beta wondering, Is this a repeat of last time? What if this one would stall out again? He hoped not and tried his best to stay positive.
A neighborhood yard sign stoked optimism too: “Nothing canstopahfeteacher,” it read, referring to a local school district, “not a flood, not a stay at home order.”
There had also been the threat of Laura to contend with: On 80year-oldmason Breaux’s porch sat the plywood for boarding up windows in that storm. His daughter remained unable to live in her home after Imelda. Many had simply given up moved. He pointed out houses all around.
Walt Stelly, 41, felt tired of the storms, too. He didn’tyethave cabinets replaced in his kitchen. But he put all the energy he had into trying to find a solution to keep his house dry. Ahead of Laura, he encircled his twice-flooded home with an irrigation tube and pumped it full ofwater to act like a dam.
He filled it back up ahead of Beta, too, and hooked up two pumps to bail out anywater inside the barrier. (One pumped up to 800 gallons aminute.) On Tuesday, several others came over to eat steaks fromthe barbecuepit andmanthe pumps overnight if they had to.
“We constantly waited on the rain,” he said. “We got lucky. We got lucky.”
His wife, Mindy, 43, made contingency plans. She pulled things from the walls to put in the attic. Shehadcinderblocksandoutdoor furniture ready to stack indoor furniture on top of. She considered what she’d lift first.
Any time a hard rain was coming, neighbors called each other worried, she said. Are you picking stuff up? they will ask each other. One often left.
“It’s always a guess,” she said. “It’s always, ‘Is it going to hit us or is it not?’ It’s constantly in the back ofourminds… This timeof year especially, everyone worries constantly.”
On Wednesday, the couple still had to decide: Would they leave that barrier across the lawn until the end of storm season?