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My parents and I were unharmed, but we lost everything. The house had to be gutted. We bounced around hotels until landing in a tiny apartment. I lost my job. I went back to school thinking routine would help—it didn't. I dropped out.The tragedy was so unexpected, bizarre, and inconveniently timed that none of my friends really knew how to provide any emotional support. And I didn't know what I needed. It was difficult to explain why it hurt so badly—no one died, right? Well, except the cat. So it's all good. You get a whole new wardrobe! And books, films, furniture, toiletries, kitchenware, shoes, photographs, schoolwork, souvenirs, letters.Though I considered myself fairly minimalist, I had no idea how much I relied on my stuff, accumulated over 18 years. People are social, and it's through our relationships with others that we understand ourselves. And how we relate to others begins with how we choose to present ourselves, using our clothes to create a first impression. Losing all that in one fell swoop is like losing a language. Our belongings are not just utilitarian. By their nature of being used, they carry our personal histories in them. It's raining? Too bad, those perfect galoshes you bought for six dollars on a family trip in Fancy Gap, Virginia, are gone. Chilly? Well, you don't have that sweatshirt you picked up at a thrift store with a friend you haven't seen in two years, but here's one from Target. Grandmother, years sick, looks like she might die soon—uh-oh, you don't have any funeral clothes. It was a constant series of tiny crises. Separately, the crises didn't seem so bad, hence my friends' excitement that I got all new clothes! But it was crisis after crisis, all day, every day, and to my traumatized mind it seemed insurmountable. A few months after the fire, I was diagnosed with PTSD.Horror gave me back my normalcy. In the movies I saw my tragedy depicted constantly, reverently, in all sorts of different forms.
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