Laguna Flood Survivors Make a New Start in Lake Forest

Last month, Kathy Wright survived a night of terror.

She awoke at 3 a.m. to find water gushing through the doggie door into the Laguna Canyon home she was sharing with her partner, Kim Jensen, and three small children. She screamed to wake everyone up.

“I heard the sound of water like you’ve never heard before," Wright recalled. "It was like Niagara Falls. It was horrifying. Within 10 minutes, the water was up to my neck. It was so quick.”

The children were floating on their mattresses, crying. Wright's calls to 911 had yet to yield help. The refrigerator and heavy bookcases were adrift in the whirlpool, crashing into walls and the women. Jensen tried to escape through a kitchen window but nearly got swept away by the rushing water that had swelled up from a creek 50 feet from the home.

They managed to get the children—Kathy’s nieces and nephew, ages 4, 7 and 8—into the attic and out of the water’s reach. Finally, two hours later, rescuers helped to pull Wright and the children to safety. Jensen stayed behind to ensure the safety of her Doberman and two cats, Wright said.

“I was terrified for Kim being in that disgusting water, with dead animals and tree branches floating around,” Wright said. “She sat there for 12 hours in that skanky freezing-cold water,” before finally evacuating to safety.

Finally, Wright, Jensen and the children were safe after the Dec. 22 flooding that destroyed their home and nearly everything inside it.

But their ordeal was only beginning, and it had come at an inopportune time.

Just seven weeks earlier, the grandmother who had been raising the children died unexpectedly. That left 57-year-old Wright as their primary caretaker, a tall order for a recent retiree who had never raised children of her own.

Nearly all of their possessions were destroyed or lost in the flood, including the Christmas presents that would have been under the tree. The Red Cross gave the family $1,800 on Christmas Eve, but the Laguna house was uninhabitable, so Wright found herself desperately house-hunting on Christmas Day.

Finding a landlord to rent to a couple with three small kids, two cats and a large dog seemed nearly impossible, so they split the efforts for their search. Jensen found a new home in San Juan Capistrano, while Wright and the children rented a home in Lake Forest.

The move here was a natural fit for Wright, who recently retired from UPS Inc., where she had spent 23 of her 27 years there making deliveries in Lake Forest.

Wright enrolled the two older children, Mina and Cole “C.J.” Marold, at . Since then, Wright said, she has been awed by the generosity of Aliso’s staff and parents, who have donated furniture, clothing, toys, lamps, dishes and other things. One group has even offered to help send the two older children to summer camp.

“We have received so much help in Lake Forest, and we are so grateful,” Wright said.

Coping with the aftermath of the flood has complicated an already difficult situation for Wright and the children.

Last summer, Wright bought a motor home and was prepared to leave in November on a six-month road trip across the United States. She had sold or put most of her worldly possessions into storage, she said.

But then the grandmother and guardian of her niece’s three children died suddenly at age 55. She had raised them almost from birth.

Wright stepped up to care for 8-year-old Mina, 7-year-old C.J., and 4-year-old Elizabeth, moving them to Orange County from Arizona until their parents are in a position to properly care for them.  (Wright said her niece works at night, and her modest salary cannot cover the cost of their overnight care. She is no longer involved with their father, who has been in and out of jail.) Jensen offered to share her Laguna home with the children, who then spent only a week-and-a-half in a Laguna Beach school before the flooding displaced them.

As Wright helps them cope with the trauma of losing their grandmother and surviving the flood, she has also gotten a crash course in parenting. That has meant learning to juggle the after-school homework routine and convince the kids to eat more fruit and vegetables than they ever have before, she said.

“The biggest surprise for me is just how exhausted I am at the end of the day. It’s mentally exhausting,” said Wright. “I think it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done.”

Elizabeth is now enrolled in preschool for the first time, and Wright is tapping her retirement income to enroll all three in gymnastics, basically the first organized activity any of them have ever participated in.

“They’ve never had many rules or consequences to this point,” Wright said. “I think they actually like and enjoy it.”

 Mina recalled the flood as “very scary” and said the worst part was losing her Barbie motor-home toy. Her Barbie Corvette was one of the few toys Wright was able to salvage from the flood.

That Corvette now sits in the corner of the room she shares with Elizabeth. Almost everything else in the room—from the beds and dressers to the children’s clothes—were given to Wright after the flood.

While the family’s immediate needs for shelter, food, and clothes have been met, Wright is still coping with struggles common to those displaced by natural disasters.

This week, for example, she said DirecTV charged her $293 for equipment destroyed in the flood, saying she is liable because FEMA (the Federal Emergency Management Agency) has not declared a federal state of emergency.

Whatever happens going forward, Wright said she is committed to giving Mina, C.J. and Elizabeth what they need to grow up healthy and happy.

“The hardest thing is I felt like I took these kids out of the only home they’ve ever known, to what? I felt really guilty, after the flood, even if it wasn’t my fault,” she said.

“They need to know that their life is going to be different,” she said. “They need to know that I’m here for them, no matter what.”