A series of wildfires burning across the state of California this month have wrought a tremendous amount of havoc and destruction on countless families.
The Tubbs fire in Napa and Sonoma counties has been one of the most destructive wildfires of the year. In fact, the Los Angeles Times recently declared it one of the five deadliest fires in California's history. People have died, and property has been destroyed as a result of the blaze.
One family experienced the Tubbs fire firsthand. Katie Rose Delzell took to social media to share a powerful photo of herself and her husband standing amid the rubble of their home. Alongside the incredible image, Katie shared the important and uplifting lesson she learned during this tragedy.
Scroll through to learn more about the backstory behind this powerful photo!
If you'd like to help the Delzell family, check out their GoFundMe.
Thumbnail Photo: Facebook / Katie Rose Delzell
In a post shared with Love What Matters, Katie writes:
I am a stay-at-home mom during the day and work a part-time night shift at Safeway. On late Sunday night at 11:00 PM I woke up getting ready for work and smelled smoke.
I was worried the fire was getting close so I asked my husband to check the status.
At the time the fire was on the mountain quite a few miles away and we didn’t feel like we were in immediate danger. I headed off to work at midnight.
While at work I kept an ear on the scanners covering the fire. I started to worry when I heard things like, 'We are unable to make it to that location please send another unit.'
I finally heard that the fire had jumped the freeway and was approaching my neighborhood at around 2:00 AM.
I tried to reach my husband by phone a few times and he wasn’t answering so I dialed the neighbor and told him what was going on.
I asked him to wake up my husband and get the kids ready to leave. We have three small children under the age of six.
I got in my car and rushed to the house where my kids were dressed and getting shoes on.
We got them in the car and buckled up and I looked at my husband and said ‘OK, now what do we grab?!’
He looked me in the eye and said, 'Everything in that house is replaceable. We have everything we need in the car.'
We grabbed literally nothing and drove away with just our family.
We headed west toward the coast to a friends house in Sebastopol while we waited to hear the path of the fire.
We had kept in contact with our neighbor the entire time who made it back to our street at around 6 AM, that is when we learned our house was no longer standing.
Not just our house but our street and our entire surrounding area.
As soon as I heard the news, I felt the need to go see. We packed up our kids once again, dropped them off with relatives and went to go check out the rubble.
As we were sorting through what was left of our house the best man from our wedding drove up unannounced. He got out and helped us sort through anything we could find left in the rubble.
We stood next to each other, smiling at the camera and took a couple photos.
Before we went to leave, I looked at my husband and he gave me a loving kiss. It was a candid moment that I am so thankful our friend caught on camera.
I don’t know if it was pure shock, disbelief, or just simple strength that got me through that moment without any tears.
Knowing that I was sifting through my burnt belongings with my best friend made that task easy.
I thought I knew before, but this incident proved that I literally need nothing but my best friend and my babies.
He was right when he said everything in our house is replaceable except our family. I am so lucky to have found a man willing to stick by me through everything with love first.
Because now and always 'love is all there is.'
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