I remember Hurricane Hugo ripping through the Carolinas, including Charlotte, more than 30 years ago, and the devastation it left in its wake. The next morning it looked like a combat zone. But neighbors were up and about, grim faced but determined, working to sort through the damage, fix things and help each other out.
There were no catchy slogans like "Carolina Strong," no hashtags on Twitter. Just people doing what people have been doing since the dawn of humankind: Making the best of a bad situation and lending a helping hand.
Just goes to show what can be accomplished when everyone is in it together.
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We flew home from Nashville on Monday night and the tornadoes touched down a few hours later. So sad for the city and its beautiful people…
We are not religious in our family, but I've raised my son to understand that religion is good when it is used for good. Here, with her better than elegant prose, Ms Renkl shows us the best of the best:
...we also understand that we can be God’s hands here in the rubble, helping our neighbors dig out.
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@common sense advocate
Hi csa! Thank goodness your flight left when it did and you and your son and family arrived home safely.
My wonderful late 86 yr. old mother-in-law landed an hour before Hurricane Andrew had landed in Miami so many years ago. She and her boyfriend and neighbors in their complex all survived that storm too, mostly by pitching in and sharing food, bottled water and other key essentials. She didn't know how their luck may have lasted without the help of so many others in a similar plight.
Hope all is good with you. Miss seeing your thoughtful and insightful comments.
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Dear Ms. Renkl,
You and yours, all our people from Tennessee, have been in our caring thoughts these last few days, and it was a relief mixed with grief, to read your account of this devastating tornado. It brought back memories of 'Katrina', when those of us in the humanitarian field placed on combat boots, and pitched in.
Thank you for letting us know how we can help, and this evening, not a leaf is stirring in this neck-of-the-woods. On a long journey, a child once asked a horse who was carrying him 'What is the bravest thing you've ever said?' 'Help', said the horse and it was a timely reminder from another author; Charlie Mackesy is his name.
What you have told us is food for the soul, and a time to act and not to weep.
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Another poignant and eloquent essay from Margaret Renkl. I not only sympathize and offer my prayers for those affected by this devastating tornado, but I also empathize with all those folks. I saw up close and personally the horror of our 2017 Tubb's Fire. Lives here were lost, people injured, businesses literally burned to the ground, and hundreds upon hundreds left homeless. Like Margaret and in one of our most severely affected Santa Rosa areas, house after house would be destroyed, yet there would stand in-tact a home here or there untouched. What I want to do is make this point: Our politics, our ethnicity, our race, and religion made no difference. We became a community united in helping each other for days, weeks, and even months on hand. It is sad that it takes natural and sometimes man-made - as during 9/11- disasters to become a family of love and compassion. Maybe some day we will follow the Prayer of St. Francis: Make me an instrument of thy peace.
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"All across this city, people are showing up to help friends and strangers. They are showing up with work gloves and chain saws and garbage bags and tarps. They are making casseroles by the dozens and sandwiches by the hundreds. They are making repeat trips to big-box stores for flashlights and batteries and blankets and nonperishable food and baby formula and diapers and tampons and hand wipes and over-the-counter medicines, and then they are giving it all away."
This degree of selflessness, kindness and compassion demonstrated in Nashville and surrounding areas by so many friends, neighbors and strangers alike made my heart melt and my eyes teared.
This is the kind of response I would hope every community in this country would have if disaster struck and that friends, neighbors and strangers could be "God's hands in the rubble, helping neighbors did out."
Suffering, loss and grief never gets easier to cope or understand, only more familiar.
Another powerful and inspirational article. People helping those in need never goes out of fashion for there is always someone who is worse off and is struggling, whether it be from a disaster or just having a difficult time trying to feed one's family instead of going hungry.
Thank you Ms. Renkl. You are a major reason why I subscribe to the NYTimes.
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@Marge Keller Hi, Marge. Great comment!
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Once again, thank you.
Judging from what I see on tv the victims were all white or mostly so. Either this shows the degree of housing segregation in Nashville or the degree to which no white victims are ignored in the media. Take your pick
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Judging from what I see on tv the victims were all white or mostly so. Either this shows the degree of housing segregation in Nashville or the degree to which nonwhite victims are ignored in the media. Take your pick
thank you, Margaret Renkl. thank you.
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I feel like this #Strong stuff is being played out. I mean, if I don't have "#[InsertCause]Strong" hashtag, does that mean I've given up and I'm prone to just rolling over?
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Thank God for poets, those who express our deepest challenges, sorrows and even joy ... softly answering our deepest question …. “Am I alone?” “No!” says this Poet of Community, reminding us of commonality, rest, hope and the urge to help. This is far greater than any fear, for we know the sound of Truth. We feel it in the depths of our Being. Thank You Margaret Renkl
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I own property in Nashville. It is a small, prejudiced small minded Southern city. There’s nothing special about it.
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Hats off to Democrats who went to the polls when all the weather gods were against them! Thank you!
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"One day the sun in shining....the next day everything is broken...you're trapped in your own crazy snow globe. "
Our own private Katrinas....
Thank you again Margaret, your writing casts warmth, understanding,, hope into our darkest corners.
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Great. Now consider the rest of us harmed by GOP votes in Tennessee. Only your immediate neighbors count?
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“Compassion is contagious.” And, we humans are wired for compassion. Thanks for your writing, Margaret. Truly. Always.
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Another example of the true definition of a survivor.
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Trump cared more about telling a story about a boy flying through the air than of his parents and sister who died.
Tennessee, grieve your tragedy, rebuild, and then help us get rid of this awful national tornado ripping our nation apart.
A man who wears bright red campaign hat to a town ripped apart cares little for your state and its wonderful people.
Remember that.
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Honestly I’m so tired of #Strong hashtags. We have systemic basic failures in our society and papering them over with feel good hashtags isn’t much different than Trumps response to the virus. Thanks for trying.
Lets bring back the WIN (whip inflation now) button from the Ford administration worn upside down it means No Immediate Miracles. Ain’t that the truth?
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Beautiful words for a horrible tragedy.
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Thank you Margaret Renkl for helping us to better understand what is beyond understanding.
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The Cookeville tornado was much more destructive and killed more people but it's not the capital city, is it? It must be that the children who died in the Cookeville storm were not that important.
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Mr. Shamburger’s frightening video accompanying this piece reminded me of the horror of Baghdad being besieged by multiple cruise missile attacks at the start of the Iraq War.
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One thing to add... "Nashville will be back in business in no time." My company is on Main Street. (Our building was hit badly, but the team is safe.) We appreciate the great restaurants and venues here in our home town. We love being a meetup and a getaway for hundreds of thousands of people each year. There is a reason we are one of the most popular travel destinations and are one of the fastest growing job markets. There is a lot of work to do after the storms, and it will all get done. Ya'll come see us! Just wait till NES gets the lights on.
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"None of this is surprising. This is what Southerners, what all rural communities, are famous for."
I'm sorry - I'll be the spoiler. You are not special. Southerners are not special. Rural communities are not special. Did NYC not respond similarly after 9/11? Did Japan not respond similarly after a typhoon hit their island? Did Australia not respond similarly to the wildfires that occurred in the last few months? Did Florence (Firenze), Italy not respond similarly after the devastating 1966 Arno River flood? Etc, etc, etc.......
This is how the human race SHOULD respond to all tragedies, no matter when, where, whatever. And in the vast majority of cases, they do. The idea that Americans or rural folks or Southerners are different and special human beings is arrogant. Problem is, it all too often takes a tragedy before action is taken and sacrifice is offered. Let's check on the status of #EarthStrong regarding the impending issues of climate change. The response of Americans is not so surprising on that front.
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there is nothing giving or loving or caring about a state that has red representation, which is the opposite of loving or caring
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It’s very nice to see the good people of Tennessee help each other. But Tennessee didn’t expand Medicaid, their rural hospitals struggle to stay open, and too many depend on pop up medical clinics for healthcare. Add in the corona virus along with this disaster and you can see that voting republican and an aversion to paying taxes really can kill you.
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Let me add another perspective after reflecting on this note of hopeful defiance. I was spared destruction that swept within five blocks of my house and no small degree of survivor's guilt. Yet I was hit in 1998 (and the flood and multiple weather events in between). For those events, yes, the properties will come back. Insurance companies insist on repairs with their payments, which in the past forced slum lords to upgrade buildings contributing to East Nashville and Germantown's gentrification. Many of the people do not. Only a few people on several of my blocks predate 1998. There are the memories of people fighting insurance companies for payments (I was lucky), some ending with half of their roofs repaired or worse, broken. Older residents were most vulnerable. Many others left either lacking resources or being priced out when their properties were redeveloped. Many small businesses never recovered. Already we are seeing some familiar business moving out of state. Others will not come back. The survivors may come back strong but it takes years, not months. Often many years. The PTSD at the alarm from the weather radio lasts decades. The memories of the phantom canopy of stately trees gone nearly a quarter century lingers even among survivors. This outweighs the excitement at seeing the Five Points in international news.
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A very nice article. Nashville is a beautiful town and it's sad to see the damage wrought by the tornado. And the caring response by those in the community is also very heart-warming. I wish all the best to those recovering from this event.
But warm fuzzies about a divine providence are not going to help the future people of Nashville. Electing candidates who will do something about greenhouse gasses will.
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Wouldn't it be nice if people had the foresight and good character to respond to the challenges of the unfolding climate change disasters as forcefully as they deal with the immediate super storms made so powerful by global warming?
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@Steve :O
Ooooo i always click to hit submit to soon... edits required. Should be "slowly unfolding climate change" and "immediate aftermath of super storms".
Great perspective. Thank you. I especially appreciate the POV "private Katrina." Thought provoking.
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There are magnificent actions that manifest during difficult times. Heroes are neighbors, generosity appears from strangers, grief is a shared emotion and recovery is a team effort.
Nashville and environs represent the very heart of the South. Any loss and damage there is felt by Southerners everywhere. Like the Ryman is the mother church of country music, Middle Tennessee is our Promised Land.
Your thoughts are quite moving. The community spirit you describe is inspiring.
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I'm a native Nashvillian living in France for the last 35 years. Your article reminds me of the better part of the old South I left behind. I am always saddened to see the transformations of Nashville. But I see some of the old spirit still remains.
Thank you
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"What It Means to be #NationalHealthCare Strong"
Nothing! Estimates are that upwards of 40,000 in the US die prematurely every year due to the lack of affordable or available health care. Where are the American people, the Southerners, the rural folks? Nowhere to be seen or heard.
But mid-twenties die in tornadoes, and suddenly many are caring, generous, helpful, willing to sacrifice, etc. As if we all are heroes.
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@Winemaker
We might agree on the vital problem of healthcare and Republican intransigence in solving it, although on that topic, I can only guess your opinions and you don't know mine. But your bringing up heathcare only makes sense in this context if you thing Nashvillians deserved this for supposedly disagreeing with your politics. Your ilk regularly does this victim-blaming with hurricanes in Houston, aspiring to the lecherous piety of Pat Robertson during Katrina. Be a better human being.
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@winemaker Beautifully put. This is a lot of nonsense. Nashville type absolute nonsense, with which I am very familiar.
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@WT "only makes sense in this context"
As you said, you can only guess my opinions. The same can be said for my meaning. One can attribute many meanings to any set of words, requiring further questioning if you want to discover the meaning intended. Arbitrarily assuming the worst meaning, as the only possible meaning, is a common reaction of the human mind.
I did not mean Nashville deserved this nor deserved blame. The point is we embellish these common responses to tragedies which in the big scheme of things are quite minor wrt casualties/impact, while ignoring much larger issues and calamities, such as health care, that result in over 100 deaths every single day, every month, every single year. For one major reason - our love of money (even though if - and I know it's a big IF - properly managed, national health care should actually save money overall).
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Your writings always remind me of the power of love in our lives and thereby, our shared humanity. This beautifully written response to my hometown's current disaster fills me with the hope that we are, deep down inside, our brother's/sister's keeper. Thank you for reminding us that the love and care of those in need are what we are called to do. Now if only we can extend this out into the world.
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Since the devastation, Ive been awaiting your observations. Thank you again Margaret for magnificent observations, this time in the face of widespread calamity. Your voice gives grace and hope to the human condition.
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@Douglas Spier
Amen.
@Douglas Spier Your comments about Margaret Renkl’s insights on the human condition....thank you
This is a magnificent local response. Would that it could be a national reality instead of the tribalism, rancor and divisiveness that seem predominate in our times.
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I'm a native Nashvillian who has lived in Oklahoma's tornado alley for 50+ years, so everything about this article interests me. What an excellent essay and author. Thank you for your humanity.
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for days, the coverage was about the stores and restaurants on the east side, which is unfortunate for their staff and owners; it took far too long for the focus to turn to the many people who lost their homes on the north side
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Another beautiful article from Ms Renkl.
Thank you.
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fantastic. You have captured some of my exact thoughts in a truly meaningful way. The contrast between those in the path of the tornado and other parts of the city is part of the pain. The notion of destruction and yet elsewhere, normalcy. complete and utter normalcy. Thank you for giving words to what this feels like and how this has, will and can motivate us to piece our city back together.
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It's all true. People are good everywhere, and it's evident here this week. I had the luxury of tornado sirens going off all night on top of being safe in my neighborhood. And the odd emotional experience, explained to me by a psychologist, of being less upset about the lives and homes lost by strangers in Germantown or Five Points or Cookeville than by the video that greeted me when I clicked on a local news site in the morning and saw nearly nothing left of the Basement East, water pouring out of a large pipe near the ceiling in front of the stage like an endless river. When I moved back here a couple years ago, I binged on live music; still am. So many memories there of good friends and family and music, tickets to shows that aren't going to happen next week and next month, and it was all gone in an instant. The staff getting to safety, that relieved me - they've been very kind to an old man who can't stand up through shows. Or dig through rubble. But it has been inspiring to see all the community responses described.
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Nashville, like New Orleans, a great city to visit but I wouldn’t want to live there. This from someone who lived there for 15 years. Small minded people, resistant to and resentful of outsiders. Non-southerners not welcome. But, good luck with the recovery.
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@MDB I'm sorry you had a bad experience in Nashville. We moved here from Chicago five years ago and have had completely the opposite experience. We have felt welcomed and cared for (my husband had Lou Gehrigs). Natives have helped us acclimate and introduced us to the wonderful culture and beauty that is Nashville. Possibly, you get out of it what you put into it.
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I’m with Melinda. We moved from Pittsburgh - a wonderfully hospitable city-to Nashville eight years ago. We’ve felt nothing but welcome. And Nashville is far from small-minded. In fact it’s quite progressive and not just for the South.
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@Slim Wilson I don't think that things are always that simple.
I live in a small town that prides itself on its friendliness. Church attendance is high and newcomers to church are welcomed with open arms.
There is a small welfare population. Those people are ostracized.
There is a person living in this town who, for being slightly different, was bullied and made fun of, in school and on the bus, during her entire 12 years of school. She is now an adult, still living in the community. Despite the unkindness that was shown to her, she herself is sweet and kind. She doesn't go to church. She is still shunned by the community, the same people who were cruel to her in school. These people are now adults with families. They have children who are learning from their parents how to treat people who are different.
And yet you and Melinda could move to this town and "feel nothing but welcome."
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I live here. She is telling it exactly like it is, beautifully. THOUSANDS of people have turned out to help. As they did almost exactly ten years ago with an unimaginable flood. There are wonderful people here, with huge hearts and great love for this city and one another. So proud of the residents of this great city.
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I am grateful for the humanity in your writings. It does my soul good.
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Most of these tragedies could be precluded or minimized, by changing the type of construction used in most Spanish Caribbean Islands.
Built of reinforced concrete with flat roofs, these homes resist most hurricane and tornados, yet year after year these destruction and loss of live continue to happen, only to benefit the building construction industry.
Think about, in Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Panama and others, there are only a handful of roofers and they are mostly poor.
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@chuck1938
How would changing the type of construction used in most Spanish Caribbean islands protect Tennessee residents from tornados ?
Wow, the narrative here is powerful stuff.
"Six miles away, people were being thrown from their beds, thrown from their homes. Windows were exploding, walls were collapsing, roofs were carried away into the sky, enormous trees were being wrenched from the ground"
The drama of great natural tragedy can't be written better. The silver lining to all the suffering and loss is exactly what Renkl goes on to describe- the joining of the community to help all those in need.
When I lived in one of the coastal canyons in S. CA we had something like this every time there was a major fire or flood and NYC became the city of brotherly love after 9-11- FOR A FEW MONTHS.
I suspect in Nashville there is a far more continuous community spirit than in either of the two places I mentioned. I hope it's enough to carry all of you through this.
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@Alan- As a native Californian, and one who has been through the Northridge quake, and our many many fires, with our actual neighborhood destroyed and burned to the ground, I can tell you you’re wrong about Californians only being community spirited for a few months. We are in forever with our friends and neighbors. As someone else put it so succinctly here, maybe you get what you give.
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@alan haigh It will. It always does.
Your mindful words, Margaret, never fail to reach a part of me that often forgets to see beyond myself. Thank you for your poetic reminders.
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I am always touched by Ms. Renkl’s writing. What hit me like a soft glove with this one was the implicit fact that our common, unspoken, commitment to instinctively come to the aid of others knows no artificial boundaries.
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Margaret, the most important word you wrote: Random. I’ve lived in Kansas now for over Twenty Years. At first, I was terrified at the thought of being in the middle of Tornado Alley. No longer. Of course I take sensible precautions. But, it’s all Random. You can be the best, or the worst person, and it matters not.
Mother Nature doesn’t play favorites, or take Prayer requests.
Mother Nature is a cruel taskmaster, but She also distributes wondrous gifts, and beautiful miracles. We notice them mostly in the Spring, but they occur Year round. Every day, if you look.
Your Community will recover, and rebuild. You will mourn, and remember those lost. You will work together, and forge friendships. In short, you will Live, again.
My very sincere Best Wishes.
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@Phyliss Dalmatian
Another fantastic and moving comment PD.
Beautifully stated.
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@Phyliss Dalmatian Yes. Random. Whoever your God may be she or he does not single out whose house or life gets destroyed or who gets spared. It was ever thus. Our job is to love and help each other before, during, and after these events (to include coronavirus). I do not hold out hope that dieties are going to help but sincerely hope human love can make a small difference.
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@Marge Keller
Thank you, friend.
Cheers.
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I first saw this response after the 2010 floods in Nashville. The community really came together. And although it didn't necessarily stay that way, it has bonded again after this horrible tragedy. The beauty of it is that no one much thinks about it--they just do it.
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Right on, Margaret! I love your articles and the kind, thoughtful, hope they convey. Thank you.
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As is always the case with Margaret Renkl, the writing is beautiful, as is the response of so many people to so tragic an event.
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@Tom Sullivan
Beautiful comment and so eloquently stated.
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