It's 9AM.
I watched a guy almost die.
Again.
If you’ve seen the news, you know twisters ripped through Little Rock and above last week.
One tore through the neighborhood ¼ mile away.
I saw the destruction first hand when I left for work.
Buildings destroyed, power out.
A scene lifted out of a nightmare.
Which put me on a news hunt.
Because we were “that” close to being hit.
In west Little Rock, a guy went outside of his business to video with his phone.
He had eyes on the screen and not the whole scene.
The phone captured the twister twisting right up on top of him.
He ran back into the building as the glass door and windows exploded in on him.
The phone fell, and shook and when he picked it up again, there was a board in the desk next to his head.
“That” close to being hit.
A lot of damage, but only one death so far.
What impressed me the most was the helpers.
I got to go to work for a graveyard shift, because commerce waits for no man or natural disaster.
The helpers got out and got busy.
I’ve talked about the Cajun Navy roaring to the rescue any time there’s a flood, but no one has much mentioned the Redneck Army.
Thousands of good old boys flooded the streets in pick up trucks with chainsaws and cases of bottled water.
They ripped and chipped and cut and sawed to clear roads, and driveways and doorways.
They piled debris and junk, boards and insulation and pieces of home just helping where they could.
Pulling people from the rubble of their homes. Picking up dogs that got loose and posting on Facebook lost pets pages.
The Redneck Army had to wait for daylight to do it all again and then my beloved small local owned businesses got into the act.
One man told his story that he was standing in his yard, now homeless, everything including his car crushed under a hundred year old oak, his other car trapped in a garage by the same tree.
Some guy drove up, hopped out with a chainsaw and proceeded to cut his car free, cut a path to his door so he could get inside to see what was left, and hardly said a word.
Tough to talk over the roar of the chainsaw and when he finished, jumped in his truck to go up the road to do it again.
He said it was the owner of Terri Lynn’s BBQ, a strip mall café staple for a few decades in WLR.
While the Red Cross pleaded for donations for their CEO and his million dollar salary and made plans to help, over twenty restaurants, cafes and breweries went to the edge of the neighborhoods and set up tables to serve food.
Even more posted on Facebook that meals were free for first responders, nurses, and emergency personnel, plus anyone affected by the storms.
Which happens again and again every time there is a disaster.
I’ve talked before about the guy who hitched his big barrel grill to the back of his truck, stopped at Sam’s to get meat and fixings and drove to where the damage was in Tennessee one time just to fee those in need.
You’ve seen stories all over about real people stepping up to help.
Mainstream media makes it a “human interest” story at the end of thirty minutes of bad news.
Which should be more of the focus than all the bad stuff they use to scare us instead.
It is a reminder we need daily.
When Shit goes down, people step up.
We need more of those people.
I complain about politicians and corporations and idiots of all ilk and make.
I complain about how they take.
But today, I’m grateful for the givers.
And grateful even more for the reminder.
When all the world around you is swirling in chaos, be the guy in the truck.
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I really enjoy reading your 9am postings. Thank you
I appreciate those good people and what they do, and the fact that so many do so is possibly part of the reason why they don't make the news as much.
News, by its nature, is unusual things happening. If the sun rises in the East, that is normal; if it rose in the West that would be news. Just the same, most people are good and help their neighbors so that is normal, when the do bad things that is not the norm and is newsworthy.