CityView Magazine

56 | November/December 2016 and losing both of her children's folders on their military careers to the flood waters ("ey're just gone..."), she said, "We are lucky, as I've said over 10,000 times." She is so gracious to the "number of people who have hopped up and helped" and also says that her husband has been phenomenal throughout it all. "I've learned a lot about my- self, my husband and my neighbors," she said. As for the strange choreography she has witnessed throughout the whole process of how things have come together, "It's been like a ballet." Looking forward, she says, "We've got a ways to go, but I'm thinking we'll be functional." When Willie Moore, a Fayetteville resident and handyman, pointed to the area behind his home on Cool Spring Street where his backyard used to be and a garden he had planted once stood, he said, spreading his hand—"it was like an ocean. Water was coming through the woods." As we walked with him around his home, he pointed to how high the water level rose and to the crawl space where the water got in under his house at the back. "It looked like a pond. I've been here for 75 years and I've never seen anything like this before. It could have been worse. It was dev - astating, but it happened. Me? I'm glad I got my life and I can sit back and talk about it now." Chris Foster of Winterlochen Road said he was finishing up work at his home when he saw something out of the corner of his eye. It was his garbage can from the kitchen floating to him. at was sometime between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. on Saturday October 8. "When I looked outside, water was gushing in, and I realized I had a prob- lem. You don't think about it. You hear the rain, but you don't think it's going to come into your house. I lost power shortly before I was rescued by the Urban Search and Rescue Team. ey tied ropes to trees so we could get through the rushing water." In looking back, Chris says that in a situa- tion like that all you have is shock. "ere is very little you can control in this situation. Moving forward in a positive manner is the only alterna- tive. I'm just taking it day by day." According to Ruthie Dent, Vice President of Marketing and Special Events at Fayetteville Area Habitat for Humanity said that of Habitat's 154 homes, 95 were affected with 66 being in desper- ate need. Homes were swallowed in about five feet of water, which led to emergency evacuations and the displacement of over 60 families. Ruthie said, "As soon as we heard the Old Wilmington Road area was hit as hard as it was, we were out there doing what we could." She explained that con- tractors were helping homeowners assess dam- age and teams of volunteers were gutting houses Mayor Nat Robertson & crew Downtown Fayetteville Cumberland Road

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