Grossman family west

At 11:01 PM on April 16, 2013, I sent the following email to some co-workers:

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Title: Joel Out for a While

This is not a joke

My house caught on fire tonight. Everyone pk (i am only one home). Fire trucks still.here, I have not been inside bur surely most things totaled. I don’t know when I will be back in commission but.upcoming travel.likely cancelled.

Not sure I will be in tomorrow.

Will email when.I know more.

Joel

Joel Grossman
Location Labs

sent from my mobile
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Today, one year later, our house looks like this:

One Year Later

and our (growing) family is all smiles:

Family Picture, March 2014

All in all, it has been a good year. We have many of you to thank for all if your help and support through the challenge and for that, we feel very lucky. Much love to you all.

—Grossman Family West

We don’t typically need jackets here in California but, just in case, the boys are prepared!

Despite the unseasonably warm and dry weather, we made the trek up to Tahoe a few weekends ago with some friends and all of the kids (age 3 and above) tried skiing. Some photos now in the Photo Gallery.

First Day of Skiing

This past November, we had our first “east bay” family photoshoot. Yes, it has been about four months since it happened but hey(!), we’re still in temporary housing, so updating the blog can be kind of tricky.

Here’s a teaser image… The album is posted in the Photo Gallery.

When Holly and I arrived home tonight, our babysitter informed us that Avi had bitten Ezra. The boys were in bed but wide awake, so we paid them a visit (they share a bedroom). We spoke to Avi about dealing with his feelings in a more productive and constructive way. We talked about how we don’t hurt other people’s bodies in this family.

Ezra (apparently our 3 year old biblical scholar) was watching the entire discussion and seized the opportunity to make a timely analogy: “Avi, you’re like Haman.”

Happy Purim, everyone!

Two hours after bedtime tonight, we found Ezra covered head-to-toe in Desitin.
Avi’s explanation (he watched Ezra do it): “Ezra wanted to look like Ice Batman.”

For comparison, here’s Arctic Batman:

“I want to look like Ezra”

(this caused some parental tension: Holly was upset that I laughed and had Ezra pose for a picture… but I think she’ll thank me in a few years)

After six exciting weeks in the hotel (the boys loved the large bed, sharing the room, and the hotel pool), we moved on June 1 into a great rental for a year while we rebuild our home. We packed everything we owned into two cars and “moved in” on a Friday morning after taking Avi to school. One upside to losing almost everything you own in a house fire: it was the easiest Moving Day ever!

We had fun in the hotel, enjoyed tasty meals generously provided by kind friends, and even found some time to visit the Jelly Belly factory and Chuck-E-Cheese. Pictures now posted in the Photo Gallery…

Avi built Batman’s home while we were living in the hotel

I am finally catching up on email and came across this gem of a video, sent to me by our Atlanta pals Robert Roberts (aka “Two Bobs”) and Hila Roberts (thanks, you two!). They found a news report of a kindred spirit: an unlucky woman who finds herself in the same predicament as Grossman Family West. Hearing her narration brought back memories of last week for me—we both lost our shoes! Then the song made me smile, because I like to sing, too.

I know what song is going to be stuck in my head this week…

After the house fire, Avi’s preschool (Gan Ilan) offered to take Ezra into the “Twos Program” for the rest of the year, even though he’s technically not quite old enough (or, wasn’t at the beginning of the year). So, unexpectedly, Wednesday, April 24, 2013 was Ezra’s first day of school!

Not knowing a lot about school, he decided to follow his big brother’s lead:

So THIS is what I’m supposed to wear to school?

And, we’re thrilled to report that he fit right in! He mastered Art, listened to his teachers, and got soaking wet during water play (without any tears, all day). Many thanks to our friends at Gan Ilan for inviting Ezra to join them!

I wonder if I can take these home…

Seen enough of these for one lifetime..

With the arrival of Monday, five days since the fire, we continue to be overwhelmed by the love, support, and generosity of friends, family, and strangers. Please please please forgive both this impersonal mass email and the fact that we have not yet responded to your kind words and offers of help. We have had our hands full with mundane items to take care of which, embarrassingly, have left us without enough time (at the moment!) to show you the personal gratitude that we would like. While the boys have remained in Seattle with extended family during the past week, Holly and Joel were fed, clothed, supported, advised, and loved from near and far. We will absolutely thank each one of you personally when we arrive on more stable ground but in the meantime please accept our deepest gratitude for all that you have done personally and the additional help that you have mobilized for us by leveraging your networks. It means the world to us that you have all been so thoughtful when we stumbled and we’re not sure what we have done to deserve it. Indeed, even before this incident, we have been so amazed by the challenges that many of you have overcome—you inspire us to keep a chin up through this inconvenience.

We wanted to send an update to try to field the most frequent questions:

• How bad was it? For those of you who can’t help but slow down and look as you are driving by a car accident (and let’s be honest—that’s all of us!), I have exciting news: we have posted both a video tour and a photo album of the damage. The more observant folks will notice changes in the pictures—they were taken over a number of days (including a set from 2 AM the night of the fire–before the boards were put up). If you have never been to our house, I highly recommend FIRST watching the video of the boys’ recent Superhero-themed birthday party, which we hosted at our house (or see the photos here), both because Holly threw a killer party and also because it sets up a powerful before/after comparison as the party was in all parts of the house. If you live in the Bay Area and want to see the wreckage in person, we’re happy to take you by. If you can learn any lessons from our loss, please do (suggested lessons: don’t use crappy heating systems, know where the fire extinguisher is, personal safety matters more than stuff, wood burns—fast, etc).
• Are you OK? Yes, we’re fine, in large part thanks to the amazing support of friends and family, near and far. Sure, it’s not as comfortable as if we were, you know, at home, but we’ve already started to buy new stuff that works just as well as the old stuff did (like shoes). That said, please don’t make fun of us if you notice us wearing the same clothes with more frequency in the coming weeks.
• Where are you living? We’re in a Hyatt House seven miles from our house, chosen because we have two attached bedrooms with a full kitchen. While we have a TV, there is no DVR, so we’re falling behind on Mad Men and Game of Thrones. Please do not give away any endings. The hotel room is small but cozy for the time being (the boys get back with Holly on Tuesday). I’m sure we’ll be going crazy in a few weeks. We are actively looking for rental houses for 12-24 months within about 5 miles from our house and have some promising leads.
• What’s next? Top priority is finding a more permanent temporary housing solution for the next 12-24 months and an attempt to return to normalcy. Joel is going to return to work on Monday. Holly and the boys return to the bay area on Tuesday, and on Wednesday Avi and Ezra will go to pre-school (the preschool invited Ezra into the “twos program” in light of the circumstances, even though he’s too young). In the background, we’ll be dealing with the insurance company… so far, this has gone decently well and we hope that that continues (I’m looking at YOU, Safeco).
• Do the boys know? Yes. Holly spoke to Avi about it this weekend and Ezra was there, as well. Ezra is two years old and we pretty much figure that “home” is where mom and dad are, so it’s not really an issue. Avi has had the very good fortune of being born into a family that has friends and family all over the country and the opportunity to travel with some frequency (Seattle for 10 days, Boston for a month, San Diego, etc) If he’s somewhere for more than a few days, he considers it a new home anyway. Thus, when told about the fire and that he’d be coming back to yet another home, it didn’t seem to phase him. We’ve got some legos waiting for him (among other toys both him and Ezra). Of course, we don’t claim to be experts and, after all, this IS the first time that we’ve had to tell our kids that their home and all of their belongings were obliterated in a catastrophic fire, so it’s possible that we’re reading them wrong. We’ll be monitoring feelings closely in the coming week.
• What do you need? We are truly doing OK at the moment. The biggest challenges right now are time and comfort (doesn’t sound all that serious when you think of it that way, right?). We are trying to create a normal situation for the boys during our time in the hotel (which may be more than one month). Playdates are much appreciated and thank you to those who have provided delicious meals. We have no space for additional “things” at the moment, so as much as we appreciate it, please don’t try to send stuff. When we find a home to rent, we’ll have more space (though even then, we hope insurance will cover the replacement cost of replacement items). We need to make some new memories, though (and that doesn’t require space in our hotel room!), so we’d love to hang out.

That’s the latest from the West coast Grossmans. We won’t be doing mass emails any more but will continue to post family updates on the Grossman Family West blog. If you are inclined, you can have those updates automatically emailed to you by registering here.

Much love,
Joel, Holly, Avi, and Ezra