I want to start this article off by saying it's coming so late because, like so many others in our area, I have spent the last few weeks putting the pieces back together in my home.

Hurricane Matthew blind sighted the Pee Dee area and wreaked havoc on our communities and homes. We have been blessed in the last few years with only mild impact from any hurricanes that blew through, and I think we all expected Matthew to be the same way. But we were all very wrong.

Friday night before impact, we'd done the usual storm preparations: stock up on non-perishables and bottled water. We got the pumps ready to prevent the typical flooding in our backyard. We were already expecting to lose power, but we weren't really worried. We all went to sleep before the rain even started.

At 8 o' clock, Saturday morning, our entire household was awake and scrambling to try and do something about the water that was already starting to trickle into our house. My dad had rushed to a hardware store to buy a bigger pump for the yard, and Mom was trying to soak up the water with all the towels, blankets, and comforters in the house. We'd already heard from the news that the rain would keep coming until the evening, so it was my job to start packing clothes and necessities for us to go stay at a friend's house.

In a lot of ways, I felt like I was packing up our lives. My mom was distraught over the thought of losing our floors and furniture because she and my dad had worked so hard to be able to have all of it.

So as I packed clothes, I started packing trivial items like my favorite books and my dream-catcher. All I could think was if this hurricane was going to rob me of our floors, our furniture, and possibly our house, I would try to save the small things, along with the memories they held.

The rain just kept coming, so we started elevating furniture and televisions, trying to salvage as much as possible. When we had done all we could, we left our home to Matthew's mercy, and took everything from groceries and clothes to our two cats and two dogs with us.

Thankfully, our friends' home was untouched by the rising water in our town, so we waited it out inside. I started scrolling through social media and talking with my friends to find out how the hurricane was affecting them. To my despair, many people were already homeless from the storm. I listened to the wind howl outside, and I later found out those gusts had been powerful enough to uproot massive oaks trees all over town. Many of those trees fell on houses and power lines, adding to the repairs that needed to be made.

By the time Matthew had passed, we all felt pretty defeated by this hurricane. Entire towns were without power and were underwater, putting us all under curfew. It was easy to see we were all hurting in our own ways and to varying degrees, but then something really beautiful started to happen.

The day after the hurricane, my parents immediately got to work assessing the damage and scooping out buckets of flood water from the inside of our home. We were blessed enough to be able to save our furniture, but the floors were almost all underwater, mildewing and buckling already.

Help came pouring in for us. Every day, there was at least one person at our house helping my dad move furniture around and scoop water out of the back yard. Our friends bought groceries and cleaning supplies, brought hot coffee, cooked meals, and provided us with places to take hot showers.

In the midst of all the damage, I saw this silver lining to the havoc Matthew had caused; we are a united community more than ever before. We cared for each other, and instead of dwelling on the personal issues we were all battling now, we came together and showed everyone what loving your neighbor looks like.

We all have a long way to go before we can get back to normal, but we will get there together, strengthening bonds and making memories along the way.