Flood on Meadow Park
I have been writing my blog for a little over a year now, and in all that time I'm surprised I have not brought up Meadow Park Drive. Meadow Park Drive is the street I grew up on, and where I still currently live.
Before we get to this week's story, I must explain the layout of my street. At the top of Meadow Park Drive are a church and funeral home. I worked at that funeral home for a small period of time…Oh my gosh, do I have a good story about that funeral home…another time. Anyways across the street from that is a bank. Those two establishments are at the top of a hill. Once you pass those two buildings there are houses on either side of the street. At the bottom of the hill, is a cul-de-sac, lovingly referred to as the “circle” for its shape. Directly behind the circle is the brick house that I grew up in.
The Friday before last I had been stuck in that house for eight days, because of Covid-19. Unfortunately, things were about to get a lot worse. As I said, my street is a hill and we live at the bottom of that hill, and there was a lot of rain early that morning. Mom got up, around 6:00 am and walked downstairs. Our cat was begging for food, so Mom walked down to the basement and realized that it was flooded. The carpet on the finished side was soaked and stuff was floating on the laundry room side.
Dad owns an art studio downtown. So when Mom told him what had happened, Dad got in his car, drove to the studio, and got his water pump. My brothers and I got up, and when dad got home we started trying to get the water out of the basement.
At this point we had realized that it wasn't just our house or our street, it had happened all over Clintonville and in other parts of Columbus. Mom started calling the neighbors to see if they were ok. At one point, she and I were upstairs, while she was on the phone. We saw one of our other neighbors, Donna, outside walking away from another neighbor.
Mom told the neighbor she was talking to that she was going to get a little more information from Donna, then hung up the phone and ran outside, and I followed. By the time we caught up to Donna, she was already in her driveway. We talked to her for about 10 minutes.
“You know,” Mom said, when we were ending the conversation with Donna, “Someone should probably check on Lisa.”
Lisa is Donna's next-door neighbor. Before Donna and I could reply, Mom was already on her way to Lisa's door. Donna and I continued the conversation until we heard mom exclaim, “Oh my gosh, I smell gas!”
Donna and I ran as fast as we could to the door. The smell hit us immediately when we got onto Lisa's property. Mom told me to go get Dad, and I ran as fast as I could. Dad, the boys and myself returned and Dad said “call 911”. Dad and I started banging on the doors and the windows, calling for Lisa.
We woke her up and got her out and got her out of the house. We could hear the sirens off in the distance. I was expecting maybe one or two fire trucks. Instead, five or six started barreling down our street. They said we had been their 7th or 8th call about a gas smell. It was happening because the water was putting out water heater pilot lights. It was a good thing we called though because we found out later that it wasn't just a pilot light, it was Lisa’s main gas line where it enters her house. The gas levels in her house were at 10%, and she couldn’t even smell it. I'm just glad we caught it in time and everyone is safe at Meadow Park Dr!
Have a Greattastic Day and be safe!
J. Mitchie Ulibarri
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