Thanks: Parents of three write in on fire relief

FROM PAGE 1 derful people in the area.

“We are humbled by the kindness and outpouring of love and support that we received from the community. The reason we moved to town was because we heard how wonderful it was to raise a family, and through this experience, we have found that to be true. We hope you all know how grateful we are for everything you have done for us.

“Additionally, we thank the Park Ridge Fire Department and

Police Department for their hard work and empathy. We are so happy we had the pleasure to meet some of you.

“We also thank the Komeshok family, Pagan family, and Considine family for providing us the essentials and starting up a collection for our family.

“Additionally, the Chimenti family, the Coleman family, the Kehrli family, and our other neighbors, were there for our family each time we went to the house after the fire.

“We are also thankful to the staff at the Borough Hall for allowing additional donations and storage of items for us until we got settled in a rental home.

“During the holidays, the Park Ridge community and Santa Brickman visited our children and allowed them to have a holiday to remember.

“We are grateful for the experiences allowed to us during this difficult time and we look forward to rebuilding and rejoining the community and seeing everyone again under much better circumstances.”

Lisa also spent time graciously answering a few questions about how the family is doing, how the ordeal unfolded, and what their next steps might be:

“Weʼre good on items, for sure, with everyoneʼs donations. Weʼre good on things. Just keep thinking about us, I guess,” she said.

She said, “Thanks for doing this [printing their thank you note]. Itʼs the only way we could think to actually get it to every single person: how much we are grateful.”

She said Jenna, 4, is in day care and, like many her age, has a tough time leaving for the day

“Sheʼs asked questions. Iactually took her there yesterday, to the house, and I showed her the back, because I wanted her to understand. She knows it as ʻthe house is sick and it has a boo-boo.ʼShe keeps asking when we can go back, so I wanted her to understand how big the boo-boo was and that it needs more time. She understood,” Lisa said.

She said of the fire, “Itʼs something that can happen any time. I canʼt even imagine what it would have been like if we were home. Itʼs something we canʼt stop thinking about — weʼre very happy we were not there.”

She said Matt got a call from their neighbor about 3 p.m. advising that the deck was on fire. “Heʼd just left work — heʼs a teacher, so heʼd just left school — and thatʼs all we knew about what we were headed to see.”

And then one of Lisaʼs friends, with an emergency scanner, called her to check in. “I picked up Jenna from school, and brought them all to my parentsʼ house, and I went up and met Matt and he was already there, our freiends were there, the Komeshoks.”

It was a passing motorist whoʼd first called 9-1-1. “It happened so fast. Weʼd just gotten our

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