I am a Red Cross volunteer and I love it!

WSBTV.com - News - Fires Hit Two Metro Apartment Complexes
As a Red Cross Disaster Volunteer, I love what I do with the Red Cross. I am on the Disaster Response Team. As a DAT Team Member, Iassess the disaster area & damage and try to provide relief to the victims. Another big part of the job is to retrieve medicine, glasses, pets, and everything else I can salvage from the disaster area if the building is not safe enough for people to enter into.

I responded to another fire in Duluth on Sunday, April 10th. I was called out around noon on Sunday. I began my walk through of the burned apartments doing damage assessment .... the first two levels only had minor water and smoke damage. The top units were completely burned. There were no ceilings or walls - only a floor. I looked out at the tops of trees.

I will never forget some of the smallest details...they are the ones that stick out in my mind and follow me where ever I go. It was so errie and dark and quiet (all electricity off) so even mundane sounds were no longer. The only thing I hear is dripping water and creaking from three stories above you. Tom, the fireman that escorted me in said we only had a few minutes to spare. Everything was burned. It looked like wet, gray, soggy newspapers. The only identifiable object left was a little ceramic figurine of a tiny African American girl fishing.

I ended up assisting several families today. I am so grateful to be a part of something that helps bring order to catastrophe.Not only does the Red Cross give money right then and there, but bears for the little kids, clean up kits, care kits. We have food and blankets delivered for these folks. I can't imagine losing the things in my life that can't be replaced like the photos or my babies locks of hair. I know that life is above all the most important, but memories rank right up there.