Six weeks after Steffi's funeral my house burned and was a total loss. Everyone avoided me. There had been many front page stories in the newspaper about her father's death, my lawsuit against the sheriff, and now this fire, which covered three full pages in the Sunday newspaper. There were no more friends left to turn to. Everyone was so horrified by all the things that kept happening to us (mostly in the newspaper and on radio and television) that they didn't know what to say. So they stayed away. We were completely innocent and completely isolated. The three children and I were depressed. Then a psychologist friend from the University, Dr. Tom Blackmon,had me admitted to the stress unit of the local hospital. I was furious thatg he did that, because my chuildren were left completely alone. While there I moved to the end of the hall with a typewriter and notes, and wrote up the defense (precis) of my dissertation topic. I was there over Christmas, while my two young teenagers were left home alone.
The first day I came home on leave was January 5,1979, to take the Christmas tree down. Two little children entered the house while I was gone to do laundry. The ground was covered with ice. It was the hardest freeze in history, and all the water pipes were completely frozen. There was much snow and frozen ground. The two little children managed to set the dry tree on fire. I had only been gone a few minutes (to a nearby washateria). My son and I came home to see the top third of the Christmas tree on fire. There was no water - everything was frozen. I never returned to the hospital that night. I had to find a place for my children to live. The story was on television and in all the newspapers. The five year old girl died, and I coaxed the nine year old to jump from a second story window into my arms. Her body was black with smoke. My son had tried to save the girls upstairs and suffered from smoke inhalation. There is a long story of horror here. Maybe I'll write about it some time.
My friends later told me that it was a shame that it was my house that had burned, because it was like a museum, with treasures from all over the world. In addition I had had two grand pianos, a harp, a cello, a flute, a concert organ, and a huge library of reference books and music. Everything was lost, and I never had the wherewithal to replace it and start up my music profession again. The tools of my trade were gone, three dogs were gone, my husband was gone, my daughter was gone, the house was gone, personal possessions were gone, and I was truly depressed. I still had two young teenagers (14 and 16), still more newspaper notoriety, and no friends. I felt a great affinity with Job's story in the Bible. But God wasn't through with me yet! Actually, I'm still waiting for the happy ending that is to come!
I couldn't find decent housing anywhere. I was only 40% insured (rapid inflation had just taken place). Apartments would not take children, especially not teenagers, although mine were perfectly well behaved. In fact, I had just received an award and certificate from the Chamber of Commerce for home beautification.
I finally found an apartment, and moved in with no furniture. Donations from the community were in boxes on the floor, but the best items were stolen from the church before I ever got them! We weren't in the new apartment much more than a week when it was flooded by a backed up sewer. The landlady had taken a $300 extra deposit for my three dead dogs. I guess she thought they were living. Then she had gone to Germany, and I couldn't get any money back or anything fixed. We couldn't stay in that sewer stench, so I finally moved to another apartment and forfeited the deposit. Then I started going through the burned up house to see what could be salvaged. There was no one to help. The day of the fire had been the biggest freeze in history, and everything was frozen to the floor with water from firehoses. The ice on the floor was five inches deep! I couldn't move any furniture out of the house for over two months, until the ice melted in late March. (There had been a fire hydrant in front of my house but that didn't help It was frozen too. Firemen had to go three blocks away to get water!.) Finally I stored whatever I could find in the garage. But later that was broken into, and everything I had worked so hard to salvage was stolen. The ice storm was declared a disater in Dallas county, where the only losses were trees, but compensation stopped at the county line, not including Denton County. So my loss, the greatest disaster, was not covered by any compensation. The kids and I stayed with a family across town until we could find an apartment. That took about three weeks!
About two weeks later I got a phone call from a neighbor that people were looting the burned house. I called the police and they said, "Lady, we can't take time to go by your house and check. I was upset at that because I had just paid five hundred dollars in taxes the week before. My two cars were ruined by vandals. All the windows were broken, and the tires were slashed. And on and on! The vandals took everything that was salvageable, so we really didn't salvage anything from our three story home.
