A lesson learned

With the summer months under their belts, the family’s hotel and townhouse stays were the farthest things from their minds, next to, of course, the fire itself. Though the incident had significantly impacted the trio’s lives, the Greene’s remained emotionally stalwart.

It would be an understatement to say that the fire was very draining for the family. However, all three held their heads high and kept moving on. For them, lingering on the tragic idea that they lost everything they owned was absolutely not an option. Feeling sorry for themselves and not making the most of their situation would allow their emotions to be infiltrated by despair, and that was not in the least what they had planned.

“It was just one of those things where you have to deal with things when they happen. You can’t fold, you can’t give up, you have to keep moving, and I just think that we didn’t really think about it a lot, which might sound kind of weird,” Charis said. “I think the way that Isis and I cope with things is to put them out of our minds, so we weren’t really focused on it.”

After Isis’s new school year had begun and summer was long gone, the Greene’s occupied themselves with the lives they led prior to their experiences throughout their displacement – this time, with a lesson learned.

This was the philosophy of family: the aspect of how each family member just expected their family, home, and belongings to last until they chose to surrender them voluntarily. The fire opened up the wholly fresh realization that that philosophy is false, and gave an additional familial appreciation to each Charis, Sarah, and Isis.

Somehow, the flames introduced the unimportance of belongings.

Each family member’s eyes were opened to not “what,” but “who” they truly care about. This is because when the orange light and enveloping vapor were cast down upon them, their treasured belongings suddenly didn’t matter any more.

“I was always worried about my makeup, and my Uggs, and my phone, because it’s stuff that we take a lot of value and a lot of pride in,” Isis said. “It showed me that that doesn’t matter as much as I thought it did, because in the heat of the moment when it was all burning, that was the last thing I thought about.”