‘I’m happy to be home’

The Meister family is back in their Bluebird Canyon Drive home after a 14-month odyssey that began when the house next door slid into the children’s bedrooms.

They are the first to return of 16 families whose homes were badly damaged or lost in the June 1, 2005 landslide that displaced hundreds for weeks, said Bob Burnham, the city’s community recovery coordinator who has been overseeing the restoration of the neighborhood.

Some of the displaced families have moved on, and one slide victim, Lew Geiser, died of cancer last spring at his damaged home, by special arrangement with authorities.

Several slide families whose homes had to be demolished are in the planning process to rebuild when their lots will be fully restored, expected this spring, Burnham said.

Homes that were not destroyed beyond repair are in the process of being made habitable.

“Four [landslide] homes are now under repair and we expect occupancy in three to four months,” Burnham said.

Along with three other landslide families, the Meisters have been living in a donated mobile home on donated land on Canyon Acres Road, Laguna Canyon, since December.

The family is delighted to be able to move back home, but carry feelings of sadness for those they are leaving behind.

“It kills me to see my neighbors [in Canyon Acres] still driving to their trailers,” Laurel Meister said.

The other residents of the small “trailer park” will likely remain displaced for another 18 months while their homes are rebuilt, Burnham predicts.

The Meisters’ vacated mobile home will be turned over to another landslide-affected couple, John Gustafson and Jim Moore, who have been living in a city-owned cottage on Third Street that is slated for demolition.

The Meisters know they have been very lucky, in many ways, compared to others in Bluebird Canyon.

“The other three [families living on Canyon Acres] own property on Flamingo Road and are not likely to move back for 12 to 18 months,” Burnham said.

The Meisters feel especially lucky compared to their next-door neighbors up Bluebird Canyon Drive, whose homes are now completely gone, demolished as beyond repair. Three homes were lost on that portion of roadway.

“We had lived here less than two years and had begun making improvements,” Laurel said, when the slide hit.

The Meisters escaped the worst of it.

Laurel, her husband Howard, and children Hailey, then 4, and Ty, just 1, were away from home when the earth moved.

Laurel is especially grateful the children were spared the terror of watching the neighborhood crumble before their eyes on that fateful morning.

The children could have been in real danger.

“It was a slow-moving slide, but Ty’s room was pushed in and all the furnishings were crunched against the door,” recalled Laurel. “You can still see the marks on his door.”

The Meisters returned from their trip only to evacuate to a friend’s home, the first of three places they landed until securing one of the donated mobile homes.

“The great thing about the mobile home was that I knew it would be the last place we’d be going before we went home,” Laurel said.

Laurel is relieved to be leaving the small mobile home where her children had to share a room and she had little space to pursue her art career. She sold her child-oriented paintings at the Sawdust Art Festival over the summer.

“We repaired the home minimally because we wanted to come home,” Laurel said. “We’re doing all the work ourselves.”

Tar paper still covers the lower outside of the house, and ceiling fixtures and floors are still unfinished.

Laurel’s mother hosed down the dirt-encrusted house as a finishing touch before the family moved back in.

The children are sleeping on mattresses on the floor in one of the front rooms until their bedrooms are completed.

Although they are back home, they must contend with the enormous excavation project taking place above and beside them. It’s like living in a huge sand box.

An enormous mound of dirt, 60 to 70 feet tall, looms over their house, and bulldozers and diggers roll by the back door constantly, churning up dust.

“They’re storing dirt in my yard, but by mid-January this will all be gone,” Laurel said. “It’s unnerving, but I’m happy to be home.”

The house, built in 1958, is solid, but the family had to rebuild the downstairs bedrooms, mostly with their own hands.

Howard Meister — known as “Tripp” — and family members performed the heavy construction, while Laurel is doing the finishing work and painting.

Hailey’s room is bright pink with one of her mother’s “Whimsicle” paintings on the wall.

As Laurel and Ty moved containers of belongings into the house last Friday, Hailey — celebrating her sixth birthday that day — ran gaily in and out of the house.

“The children are so resilient,” Laurel marveled.

Laurel’s artwork can be seen at www.whimsicle.com.