It’s hard to put into words what it’s like to pull up to where a family’s home once stood and see mounds and mounds of cracked, beige dirt.
To notice that a wooden, split-rail fence managed to withstand more than 20 feet of swift-moving floodwaters, yet not realize until later that the fence bordered the home’s driveway. To walk next door to a tiling warehouse, where men in white coveralls and muddy black boots are removing storm debris, and ask if there was a house next to their place of business.
And, when one answers in the affirmative, to have him walk you and your photographer to the spot where a family once laughed and cried and prayed together – all while knowing the tragic outcome of their story .
My job is to put these kinds of experiences into words. More than a week later, I’m still struggling to.
I tried to begin this piece – a brief description of my reporting in Asheville, North Carolina, as part of the USA TODAY Network’s Hurricane Helene coverage – in a light-hearted way.