Grossman family west

(I’m back-posting these two posts to capture an important moment in our family history. this is email 2 of 2)

This email was sent the morning of April 18, 2013:

We feel truly blessed, overwhelmed by the support, assistance, and well wishes from so many people, near and far. I have to admit that, living nowhere near other family, I had moments of panic (“what do I do?”) as I was sitting alone on my driveway at 11 pm watching the four engine’s worth of firefighters, in full gear, haul multiple hoses into my burning home. (“alone”, however, was a source of happiness in that moment: watching the fire billowed out of the roof and the windows of Ezra’s room blow out, I’ve never been happier to be away from my family).

The support from near and far for our family has been overwhelming: family, friends, co-workers, business partners, and even total strangers (I spent Fire Night in the house of a neighbor I’d never met) have been fantastic. We’ve been fed, clothed, shopped for, advised, and funded (literally handed cash because I had no wallet, ATM, credit cards, or ID). Our kids are taken care of. We long ago lost count of the numbers of offers of help and for that, we don’t even know how to express our gratitude. Over the past 48 hours, we have shed many more tears of appreciation, gratitude, and love than we have over any loss.

As for an update, Holly flew back to CA yesterday and got a tour of the remains; the boys are still in Seattle with family. We haven’t quite figured out what to tell Avi and Ezra yet. The insurance company has domiciled us in a local hotel and assigned a temporary housing company to start a housing search for us (we’ll likely need a rental for over a year). I’ve bought some clothes and shoes (and an incredible friend also went shopping for me and handed us bags of groceries). I grabbed a laptop from work along with cell phone chargers. Insurance investigators and adjusters are coming by later today. I’ve also been inundated by Public Assessors and Restoration Companies who literally wait at the house to hand me their card, offering to “help.”

In short, we’re OK. We have temporary lodging and resources for food and clothing. And Internet access  That covers the necessities. Holly will go back to Seattle this weekend and bring the boys back on Tuesday, as was originally scheduled. That’s where the next challenge begins, though again, there has already been an outpouring of offers of assistance in the form of playdates, clothing, etc. Avi’s teachers told us that they’re getting him a replacement Batman lunchbox.

Lots of emotions but at the end of the day, we lost stuff, most of it replaceable. That’s all that has happened. Inconvenient, to be sure, but nothing critical. We are fortunate in that we are able to buy new stuff which, over time, we’ll do. And we’ll likely appreciate that stuff even more. Or maybe less, recognizing more vividly that it will still just be replaceable stuff.

If this is our biggest challenge in life, we will have few complaints.

Due to the volume of emails, along with the time required for other logistics, I know I’m not being the most responsive. I apologize for that. It will get better over time… give me a few days to get the ball rolling and I’ll respond to emails more personally. I’ll likely move the longer explanations to our blog (www.grossmanfamilywest.com) so as not to spam your Inbox, though those who are interested can still get all of the deets.

Again, many thanks for your thoughts and assistance and much love from the west coast,
Joel and Holly

(I’m back-posting these next two posts to capture an important moment in our family history. this is email 1 of 2)

At 3:20 AM pst on Tuesday, April 17, 2013, I sent the following email to my family titled “Probably not coming to Boston” (with Holly and the boys in Seattle, I was scheduled to visit Boston that weekend… the following Monday of which happened to be the Boston Marathon bombing)

The email read:
OK, now that i’ve prepared you with a slight disappointment in the subject line, I wanted to share some more serious news. Everyone’s health is fine.

Our house burned down tonight. I was alone at home (Holly and the kids are in Seattle), nobody was hurt.

Status Updates:

• ME: I am fine. I am spending the night a very nice neighbor’s house and using her computer. I will work with the insurance company on a more permanent plan tomorrow and will keep everyone here updated (please let me know if you want me to include others). At the moment, I am expecting that all of my trips for the next week are cancelled (including my planned trip to Boston).
• PROPERTY: Nearly everything in the house is destroyed, either actually burned and gone or “unsalvageable”. I personally have no clothes (Holly: you and the kids have only whatever you have with you in Seattle). I also happen to have no shoes since i had taken them off and put them in the closet when i got home (I’m actually feeling lucky that I had left my pants on which, as Holly knows, is a rarity in the evenings!). I have no wallet. All of that is easily replaceable. The only thing that’s gone that I care about is my wedding ring (I take it off at night before bed, so it was in the bedroom). WIFE: rest assured that I love you more, not less, without it!
• CARS: I have recovered keys to our cars, which are functional (and may actually be fine… we’ll have to take a closer look in the daylight)
• GLASS HALF FULL: as some of you may know, we were getting close to breaking ground on new construction anyway. Of course, we had no plans to get rid of our stuff. Construction costs will clearly go up at this point, but I’m optimistic that insurance will kick in a hefty sum both for the house and replacement stuff. We will need to replace literally everything that we own. If I’m trying to smile, I suppose I can joke here that Holly might have a good time doing that.
• LESSONS: obviously i’m hugely thankful that nobody was actually hurt. Reflecting on it, the biggest surprise was how quickly it all happened. If I could do it over, i’d have planned better what I grabbed (like my wedding ring, wallet, and shoes). Given that there was nobody in the house, i didn’t have much to worry about and had the opportunity to grab things if it had occurred to me. Without a credit card and ID, i can’t get into a hotel (fire dept would have connected me to Red Cross had the nice neighbor not helped). The challenges of not having shoes are obvious.
• NEXT STEPS: I meet with the Insurance adjuster tomorrow, and have ordered replacement credit cards. I am hopeful that I can get myself to the bank to take out cash with my Passport (I just went back into the house to grab it). The insurance company should help with lodging, etc. I’m a little concerned how we’ll “remember” everything that was in the house in terms of filing the claim, but that’s a problem for tomorrow.

Story:

I was in the front of the house folding laundry and watching a TV show. I smelled a strange smell. At first, i thought a bug was getting fried on a lamp. Checked the lamp, no fried bug. I couldn’t quite tell where the smell was coming from. Explored the front room trying to find the source of the smell, no dice, so i went back and folded another shirt, when I smelled it again. Repeat a couple of times, no luck. Then, get this: when I couldn’t locate the source of the smell in my house, I actually wondered if a neighbor’s house was on fire, so I walked over and looked out the front window–trying to see if a neighbor’s house was on fire–and saw nothing.

Fast forward about a minute and i see smoke in my house. I’m now very confused so i run to the kitchen to make sure nothing is burning there. All is OK. So, I run towards the back of the house to the dryer (trying to think of everything that could burn). At this point, I see smoke pouring out of our bedroom (which is adjacent to the dryer). I run back into the room and something (maybe a suitcase?) was ablaze. I guess that the suitcase had fallen onto or been placed on the electric heating vent (our cleaning people came today), or maybe a spark flew up and ignited it. The suitcase fire was large enough that I couldn’t handle it or smother it with a towel, so I immediately picked up my cellphone and dialed 911 (which worked just fine from my mobile phone!)

While calling 911, i started looking for a fire extinguisher, which I know is in the house somewhere but I could not find it. When it was clear that I was not going to be able to do anything useful, I left the house.

Fire response was pretty quick (i’m guessing 5-7 minutes, though it’s a blur), but our house is basically made of kindling, so it was over before it started. I have been through it very briefly, and it’s a war zone. Holes in the ceilings, walls charred and missing, windows blown out, flooded floor (the same kind neighbor loaned me flip flops).

Fire department folks were nice enough. I called Holly and freaked her out when they first arrived, i called her back later, a bit more calm. “Official” folks (approved contractors) are going through the house now and boarding it up for security. Someone else is going through and trying to figure out what they can salvage (they’ll apparently be able to wash and clean my clothes–only the one load that I was folding in the front room). It won’t be much, as I mentioned. The fire department guy warned me that “restoration company reps” would be all over me like white on rice. Sure enough, 3 have already found me (one arrived and walked alongside me as I walked with my neighbor from my burned house to her house, after 1 AM). Amazing. Since we’re planning construction anyway, I probably won’t deal with any of them and will instead talk to the two GC’s that we were considering for construction…

That’s the news for now. Email is best since I’m going to mobile and taking care of things, so please give me some time to get back to you.

Much love in the burning night,
joel

Every once in a while, as we are capturing adorable photos of youthful exploration and self-discovery, I find my mind wandering into the future picturing our family in 15 or 20 years. It seems, tonight, that the fates have helped me as some relevant comparisons have just fallen into my lap. Cousin Josh (who currently appears to be on a decadent tour of Boston food and sporting events) sent me these three “classics”, which I thought that all GFW readers (except maybe 3 of you) would enjoy. Comments welcome!

Well, Passover may have been a a month (or more?) ago, but we haven’t forgotten it—and not just because of the box of stale matzah that’s still sitting on the kitchen counter. Indeed, we have posted a brief 8 picture photo album just for you, now in the Photo Gallery!

Which of the plagues was "Growing Vampire Fangs?"

Well, here’s a little experiment that we’re trying at GFW. We’ve integrated Facebook into the blogs. The benefits:

1. We are using the Facebook comment system, so it should be easier for you to comment on posts.
2. You can “Like” a post

Feedback welcome!

Much Love from Silicon Valley,
GFW

It is good to have famous relatives, so we were pretty excited to see dad’s cousin, Josh Narva, featured on the local ABC affiliate.

Check it out:

We’re going to try dropping his name at at local restaurants to get good tables… Congrats on the great PR, cousin Josh!

The company also has a blog, one recent article featured a 20+ year old photo of Dad (and his cousins), while another recent post was a funny one from Cousin Josh called Five Lethal Interview Mistakes.

Kind of like a bada** biker gang...

Uncle Dave and Aunt Dara are finally in South Africa, despite Heathrow’s best attempts to cancel their honeymoon! Want to get automatic email updates when they update their blog? Just go to this page to subscribe!

Did we forget anything?

Avi’s Kazoo playing on the first night of Hanukah has inspired others to make some Hanukah music, too. Here are some of our favorite Hanukah songs, all (of course) inspired by Avi’s Hanukah Kazoo:

The Maccabeats, Candlelight

Matisyahu “Miracle” (starts at about 1:25)

And, of course, Adam Sandler…

From all of us to all of you, Happy Hanukah!