There’s nothing more eye-opening than watching your world go up in flames.

It wasn’t just the houses, it wasn’t just the community, it was my childhood, my memories. 

All the places my family and I used to go, all the stores my friends and I went to visit. 

The world was pulled up from beneath me as I watched it disintegrate before my eyes.

Gone.

It’s all… gone.

The fire didn’t just destroy my house.

It destroyed the sense of stability.

It destroyed the sense of peace.

It destroyed the one place that truly felt like home.

The fire burned through our outer shells to reveal who we are at our core.

But maybe that’s not a bad thing.

Everything happens for a reason: I’ve always had faith in those simple words. 

Belief that somehow everything terrible that happens in life has its purpose. 

Maybe our world burned away so we could forge our own from its ashes.

Maybe we can build ourselves from the ground up.

The fire can destroy everything we’ve ever known, but it can’t destroy everything we choose to become.