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Thursday, May 15, 2008

Talking Can Start Healing Process

By Rory Mcclannahan
Mountain View Telegraph
      Melvin Bealmear came to the office last Thursday to show me something.
       Bealmear, who had served as Estancia's municipal court judge from 1994 to 1998, had a photo of a nice little red cabin tucked away in the Manzano Mountains. The photo looked to be old, but it wasn't as old as the cabin.
       He explained that the Telegraph had the most recent photo of the cabin on the front page that day. The photo, if you don't remember, shows all that remains of a cabin destroyed by the Trigo Fire. In those remains, surrounded by blackened earth, you could make out a fireplace and its chimney, a water heater and several tin roof panels.
       Bealmear's photo showed a nice little place, constructed of logs painted red and surrounded by lush greenery. It was quite a contrast.
       The place was known as the Hunt Cabin, named for the man who built it in the early 1920s. Bealmear said his father bought it in the late 1920s and his family would spend weekends, vacations and such there.
       “You go up there and you didn't want to leave,” Bealmear said.
       When Bealmear's father died, the cabin passed to another family member, who lived there for a time. The cabin hadn't been occupied for at least five years, Bealmear said, and it wasn't insured.
       The cabin was one of 59 homes to be destroyed by the fire, and Bealmear's story is one of thousands about the fire itself. The stories, obviously, have a recurring theme of loss. Several folks have called or come by our office to tell us their tales. And even though we can't print them all, we certainly will listen to them.
       Or read them, like in the case of Ronald Van Sice, who dropped off a nearly two-page, single-spaced, small-font narrative of his Trigo Fire experience.
       “We were only able to get my boat, a kicker outboard engine, two old pickup trucks, this laptop computer, a few clothes, an old rubber water liner that I would use when I got stuck in the mud, a fearless ferret, guns and ammunition out of the cabin and the area around the cabin,” Van Sice wrote.
       “Hardly need the guns, but you don't think straight when something like this happens.”
       He goes on to write about the slurry bombers over his home, the roar of the fire as it neared his home and loading up the trucks with a hurt shoulder that had been injured when he was unloading his truck the previous day after coming home from being evacuated. Van Sice's story will never win any awards for great prose, but that isn't why he wrote it and shared it with us.
       Years ago, I had a journalism professor tell me that sometimes after a traumatic event, people will want to talk about what happened and that many see it as a way to heal. I didn't believe his statement until I experienced it time and again first-hand. Now, I come to expect it, and the best I can do is offer an ear, or read a story. It can be gut-wrenching at times, but also awe-inspiring. A tragedy can bring out the best and worst in people.
       So, if you have a story to tell, we'd like to hear it.
       Contact Rory McClannahan at 823-7102 or online at editor@mvtelegraph.com.>   

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