While on the phone with a fellow member of the TNM this morning, I was reminded of a memory that I have carried for a decade and it’s shaped many of my decisions from that moment on.
Daniel and I started a media company many years ago and our flagship is Radio Free Texas, an online radio station specializing in Texas/Red Dirt music. Early on, we built a community and have stayed as close as family for almost 14 years. In 2008 Hurricane Ike made landfall in our community and wreaked havoc on our neighboring towns. We were fortunate but they were not. At the time, we felt helpless but then it occurred to us to organize. We put the call out to our “RFT Community” and organized a relief work weekend. They responded.
For four days, we visited multiple small communities around us and on the 4th day we landed at “ground zero”. We had a team of about 50 throughout the 4 day event, but on the last day we had just shy of half that. We had no real plan, but we made our way to Sabine Pass. A very small coastal community that suffered unimaginable devastation. We passed families with small children literally stacking cinder blocks which was all that was left of their home.
Most of us rode quietly as no words could form to describe what we were seeing. We passed the Red Cross station where no one seemed to be gathered. We passed FEMA, a ghost town and then we took a right turn off of the main drag. There on the corner was one man, alone “mucking” his house. For those who are not familiar, “mucking” is a term we use to remove flood waters and what’s left of it from a home. In this gentleman’s case it was the silt from the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico. From the floors of his modest pier and beam home to the ceilings, silt.
Daniel was leading the caravan and decided to stop and speak to the gentleman. He introduced himself and pointed to the line of cars of ready “volunteers” to get to work. We couldn’t hear what he was saying, but the look on the gentleman’s face was enough. He was indeed leary but finally nodded yes and so we bailed out and went to work.
Every single item in his home was ruined, soaked with dirty water and silt from the Gulf of Mexico. We used snow shovels to remove debris and muck until finally we reach his bedroom that he and his wife shared. There standing in the middle of the room was a king size mattress, soaked with the mess.
Daniel and the man paused briefly, hands on hips as if to say “How?”. Now I’m not sure if you’ve ever had to move a king size mattress, but imagine if it was soaked in water. The task seemed as if we would have to hire a local crane company just to move this one mattress, but then I heard the words come out of Daniel’s mouth.
“Everybody grab a piece of mattress and pull.”
So we did. We managed about 9 pairs of hands on the monster and bit by bit we pulled. We could have expended a ton of money, time and called the crane company however we grabbed a piece and pulled.
Today I was reading a comment on Facebook in regards to our work at the TNM and independence. Basically the commenter said without “the big money” in Texas, it can’t be done. I could not resist a reply to the comment but it took me back to the mattress day.
It is a fact, an organization needs fiscal help to function. We do need contributions and dollars and thankfully, bit by bit we receive. Could it be more? Of course. Will “the big money of Texas” get us there faster? Of course. However, more importantly we need people.
We need more hands on deck. We need more hands to “grab a piece of mattress and pull”. So today, I urge you to invite someone you care about into the TNM. Ask them to join. Ask them to support a referendum on independence. I bet you will be surprised at the response.
I asked a friend to join the TNM just this morning. All that I did was open my mouth and ask. Will you join me in “grabbing a piece of mattress” and ask someone, anyone, today to join you in becoming a member of the TNM?
