00:00:00TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: My name is Trudi-Ann Lawrence. Today is September third
[2013], and I am at the Bayshore Senior Center. Can you state your name?
DEBORAH KIMM: Deborah Kimm, K-i-m-m.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay, and can you share your age, if you don't mind?
DEBORAH KIMM: No, I just turned sixty in March.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay, and for the record, can you state your ethnicity or race?
DEBORAH KIMM: I'm part Italian and part German and Irish.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay, so how long have you lived in that home in Keansburg?
DEBORAH KIMM: Fifty years.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay, and do you know the cost of the home when you lived there?
DEBORAH KIMM: No, my mother actually--what happened was, my father moved us down
to Union Beach in March, and I had just turned eight, and he died that summer
because he had rheumatic fever.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: Even though he was only thirty-six. So my mother was widowed with
three children. But she's lucky that her father sent her to college during the
forties, and she became a teacher, which she really always wanted to be and she
00:01:00did enjoy that. But she passed away eight years ago.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Oh, I'm sorry. Okay, so how many rooms were in that home?
DEBORAH KIMM: Well, to start off, it originally was a bungalow. Okay, we moved
in in '61. Believe it or not, we had a coal stove, which is a one-bedroom, you
know, bungalow, and we had a coal--(laughs) you'd think it was about a hundred
years ago. But there was a coal shed in the back, I had coal delivered. And it
was probably the poorest I remember ever being. Then my mother, her aunt lent
her five thousand dollars to buy the bungalow, so she bought the bungalow, so it
was like, five thousand dollars for the bungalow in 1962 or 3 or whenever she
purchased it. Then she added an addition to it, you know, which then made it
three bedrooms, two baths and the original porch is in there. Because it's a
00:02:00retaining wall we couldn't expand the living room.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay. Is there any reason why you chose to stay there?
DEBORAH KIMM: Well, I lived with my mother almost all my life. There were
periods where I went down to Florida and that, but basically I had an Italian
mother who loved me (laughs) and she didn't kick me out. And I have a
handicapped brother. So it was my widowed mother, my handicapped brother, and
me, and my sister got married twenty years ago, and she lives somewhere else.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay, all right, so what is your current occupation if you
have one?
DEBORAH KIMM: (laughs) Well, it's disabled. Besides being a senior citizen,
yeah, that's another story. (both laugh)
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: All right. What did you do prior?
DEBORAH KIMM: I did a lot of things. When I was in my twenties I worked at the
Monmouth Mall, which is the only place I'd really want to be when you're in your
00:03:00twenties. (laughs) Then I worked at Fotomat, which is the job that you say, I
have to do something with my life, you know, so I went to secretarial school for
nine months, and then I did get to work in corporate America, temped, and then I
actually did work in New York City. I actually worked at the World Trade Center
on the 102nd floor, so that plane went in my building.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Wow.
DEBORAH KIMM: But I wasn't there. I left, like, ten years earlier than that.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: But it was just, you know. And then basically, I do suffer from
depression, so that's my disability, so that interferes with, you know, that,
and the job market has really changed in my lifetime. You know, like,
everybody--if I can go on a tangent--like everybody has lost their jobs in one
way or another. Like my sister is five years younger, so her group is fifty-five
years old. They went to college, they worked for corporate America, and then
00:04:00they got bumped out, you know?
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Right.
DEBORAH KIMM: So that's a whole another chapter about, you know, what's gone on
with the economy in my lifetime.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay. All right. So tell me about your neighborhood and the
community. Are you involved in any way?
DEBORAH KIMM: Union Beach is just two square miles, okay, and it's one square
mile of wetlands. We used to call them weeds in the old days, but now they're wetlands.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: And it's really a quiet little community. We don't really have a
big crime rate, you know. When I first moved there they didn't pave our roads. I
lived, like, down a dead-end street about a football field from the bay, and
they didn't pave our streets until the early seventies.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: What street is this?
DEBORAH KIMM: This is 507 Edmunds Avenue.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: I was really just one house away from the weeds, like a football
00:05:00field from the Raritan Bay. So I already knew we were below sea level, and you
were not allowed to put a swimming pool in, a basement, because when you would
dig a hole and the tide was in, there would actually be water in the hole.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Oh, okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: But it worked great for my tomatoes and my rose bushes, so--.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay. All right. So, tell me about when you first heard the
storm was coming. What did you expect?
DEBORAH KIMM: Okay, well, I have lived my whole life (laughs)--well, when we
first moved there it was just a bungalow. I remember the first flood we had. We
missed Hurricane Donna, okay, but there was flooding where it made all the
houses, all the little bungalows, look like houseboats.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: And my poor Italian mother who was raised in Brooklyn, I remember
her just throwing up, being seasick the whole time. So, it was something that
you just lived with, the flood. And we had all kinds of flooding, and we would
be evacuated, and we would be sitting--this was before cell phones and all
00:06:00this--and you'd be sitting in maybe a high school or a firehouse, and then you'd
be wondering, Am I going to be standing next to my house with a reporter?
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Oh.
DEBORAH KIMM: You know when you see those people and you go, I hope that doesn't
happen to me. So but what happened in '92 was, we had a full moon and a
Northeastern [Nor'easter], and the tide came in so fast that everybody lost
their cars, which was really a hardship for everybody. And so this time, when I
heard, full moon, Northeastern, hurricane, I got the hell out of there. But
usually I had dogs, I've always had dogs till about maybe two years ago, and I
did not want to leave them. So it would have been a hard--I probably might have
stayed if they were still there.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay. So you said you evacuated.
00:07:00
DEBORAH KIMM: Yeah, my sister's best friend's parents, that we've kind of known
for forty years, they were so kind that they took me to Tom's River where their
daughter is. That's my sister's best friend. And we waited out the storm and
then we called Mr. C. He went back to Union Beach, we went back to Union Beach
to see what happened, and he's lucky, nothing happened to his, he lives on the
senior citizen thing by the trailway. But it was really quite a shock because
I'm the one that--the water came up to the ceiling in the garage and it actually
came in the original bungalow over the stove, so I lost, like, almost everything
that wasn't--even though the day before I was shoving stuff upstairs--
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: --I never, never thought it would come in the house like that. I
lost some things, like my dog pictures and some things. I don't even know if I
00:08:00have my birth certificate anymore. So it was just kind of a shock that this
was--I've had the flood dream all my life, that's an anxiety dream, and this is
like, Wow, this really actually finally happened. Because it just is hanging
over your head--
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Right.
DEBORAH KIMM: --when you've lived in so many floods.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay. So where did you evacuate to?
DEBORAH KIMM: I went to Toms River--
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay, right.
DEBORAH KIMM: --with the Corneliuses, to be with their daughter, who is my
sister's best friend.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay, so what was the weather like there?
DEBORAH KIMM: They just had a lot of rain and they had trouble with trees. See,
these people who don't have floods, they have tree problems.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Right, okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: You know, like branches breaking down, so--.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: All right, so what was going through your head the next day?
When did you return home?
DEBORAH KIMM: We waited two days because they actually--I think they almost had
martial law or something, like they didn't want you on the streets. And when Mr.
00:09:00C. decided, you know--I'm the only one that went with him to just check the
houses--what was the question again? It was a senior moment.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: No, that's fine. I said, when did you return home, and what happened?
DEBORAH KIMM: Okay, we had to wait two or three days because they wouldn't
let--I think there was martial law or something where you couldn't even drive
your car for two days or something. When we went from--and this is Ocean
County--half, most of the lights, the traffic lights weren't working. There
wasn't that many people on the road, but it was very--it was like a weird movie.
Where did everybody go?
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Um-hm.
DEBORAH KIMM: And then we headed down, you know, we finally got to Union Beach,
but it was just so surreal, driving with--you know, because New Jersey's so
congested, that there wasn't much traffic, and as I said, my mother passed away
00:10:00eight years ago, this is, like, she felt so bad for the Katrina people, you
know, and I'm thinking, Whew, in a way, you know, my mom didn't get to see this.
And when she died, I had cremated, and I had her in the house because when she
moved there, she was tired of moving around with my father, and so she said,
"I'm never moving again." So I had her ashes in that filing cabinet in the
living room, but thank God my sister took them a couple months earlier--
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Oh, okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: --to bury them with my father. Otherwise, I would have lost them
in the flood, because that was on the main floor.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Right. Okay. So what was the mood of the community when you
arrived? What did you see?
DEBORAH KIMM: What happened was, like, this incredible team spirit. You know,
which is weird because when we did have that flood in '92, neighbors kind of
helped each other for just, maybe, like a week or something. But it was just
weird because--I don't know if you're from New Jersey.
00:11:00
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Yes.
DEBORAH KIMM: Okay, but New Jersey's kind of a suburbia community and people
don't even barely tal--I don't even know what's going on with people. Like next
door, like I remember them little and then I look and they're driving and I'm
like, Whoa, where did the years go, you know? So, it was just an incredible,
almost like positive experience. You know, like people being friendly and
helping you out and I found it kind of like it focused my energy instead of
getting depressed, you know what I'm saying? Because it was like, Oh okay, this
was as bad as it was gonna get, you know? But I was just shocked that the Amish
people were there. Where I was, they had stuff at the firehouse, where they were
feeding you. And they had piles of stuff, so I'd look at it. You know, I like to
00:12:00wear men's sportswear because I don't like pink and all those other colors. So I
pick it out, like, it fits, no mirror, I don't care. So you know, I started
acclimating. But I've been learning to do that when I go down to Florida and
stay with my friend, and barely eke by, you know, so I kind of got poorer in
increments, you know, instead of like (whoosh noise).
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: Yeah.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: So did you contact your insurance companies or FEMA?
DEBORAH KIMM: We didn't have any insurance, because of the fact that, it's a
litigation thing where my brother, my sister, and I own the house.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: But you contacted FEMA?
DEBORAH KIMM: Yeah, FEMA, yeah.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: And did they respond to you? Did you get any aid from them?
DEBORAH KIMM: They gave us the money for the--I think they gave me thirty-two
thousand dollars and six of it was mine, and the rest was towards the house.
00:13:00
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: So I put that in an account with my sister, who's the executor. So
the check is in my name but she's executrix, so we have an account together.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: Just to organize that.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay, so how did you clean up, when you walked in the house?
DEBORAH KIMM: (laughs) It's not even cleaning up, it's like--I did not expect,
let's see, my refrigerator fell over, which shocked--that was the force of--it
fell over and things had floated to other parts of the house. Because there
were, you know, like it's not just water, there's a current in there that's
moving everything around and down. Like one block over, there was a bicycle in
somebody's tree.
FEMALE VOICE: Oh good, I'm so sorry--
00:14:00
DEBORAH KIMM: Hello--and I'm talking to a woman. It's so nice to talk to
females, because I live (unintelligible) with my boyfriend. (laughs) That's
really interesting.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: It's like, I want to talk to somebody who has estrogen. (both
laugh) So cleanup was--you can't even imagine. It was salt water, it was
supposedly sewage. Then they had a big thing about mold and everything. So,
basically I had us just start throwing stuff out.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Um-hm.
DEBORAH KIMM: You know, just--and then I had teams come down. Like, I don't even
know what's missing.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: So I had to start all over again, which to me was an interesting
challenge. So and I've never lived by myself. Even though I was living at the
house by myself, but my brother's, like he's at a nursing home in Keansburg.
00:15:00That's why I wanted to get near Keansburg, and the FEMA card helped me get in
there, even though I was on the list.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay, so how did you cope with everything that was going on?
How did you and your community cope?
DEBORAH KIMM: They were incredibly wonderful, you know, like everybody was
friendly and helpful and because in New Jersey, it's like very,--people are very
reserved and focused on their lives, and this really leveled out everybody.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Um-hm.
DEBORAH KIMM: And it was surprising to see how helpful and kind people could be.
It was really a refreshing thing to see and experience.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Right. Okay, did you contribute any resources, any help to
the community?
DEBORAH KIMM: No, I haven't done that because (laughs)--
00:16:00
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Well that's okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: --I'm the one receiving the help and stuff.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay, so what kind of help have you received?
DEBORAH KIMM: Let me see. Project Paul helped me. When I moved into my apartment
I had no furniture or anything, and I brought along a sleeping bag and a little
TV set that was in the upstairs, you know, and they got me a bed.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Um-hm.
DEBORAH KIMM: And then, I'm trying to think. I did get giftcards from some, like
a giftcard here, a giftcard there, and that helped buy some things. And thrift
store shopping, which I'm really good at, and I get my furniture from Project
Paul. You know, I don't get it free, but I pick out some really interesting
pieces. My sister came over to my apartment and she goes, "Oh, everything looks
so old here." I go, "I'm living in the past." (laughs) So--.
00:17:00
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay, so did FEMA help in any other way apart from that?
DEBORAH KIMM: Well, FEMA helped me--I'm trying to go for the grants, so we'll
see how that turns out. If it wasn't for FEMA, I wouldn't have gotten in that building.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay, great.
DEBORAH KIMM: So they really helped me.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay. Do you believe that New Jersey prepared adequately for
the storm?
DEBORAH KIMM: No. (laughs)
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Would you like to elaborate?
DEBORAH KIMM: I don't think anybody really prepares for anything unless it's
happened before.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: You know, because they just can't imagine being over-prepared. But
that's how I feel about it.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay. How do you feel about the media portrayal of what was
going on? Do you think it was sensationalized or adequately portrayed?
DEBORAH KIMM: I think it was probably understated.
00:18:00
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Oh. Really?
DEBORAH KIMM: Yeah.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: You know, somebody told me that they're actually, Showtime is
actually doing a documentary on Union Beach, and they're coming down next
Tuesday to do some more filming.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: You know.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: All right. What do you think about the president and the
governor making an appearance in the area?
DEBORAH KIMM: Well, I am kind of--it's unreal that this is really happening,
like, because all my life, as I said, I lived with the flood dream, and, What
would happen if the house, da da da? It's still surreal, like, Oh, that's the
governor and that's the president. I don't know, it doesn't seem real, that part.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay. Did your opinion of the governor change?
DEBORAH KIMM: Well I like him, but we're having--he was doing well, but then,
there's things going on where we were on the list to be torn down and then they
00:19:00took the funds away, so that's interfering with resolving my mother's estate and
causing a lot of trouble between me and my sister.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay. Do you think the storm changed your views in any way,
like, environmentally?
DEBORAH KIMM: Well, basically, my sister wanted--I was trying to get into
Keansburg because my sister wanted to sell the house. So I was moving, but I
didn't know I was moving like that. (laughs) I watched the Al Gore movie about
global warming, and I don't know if it was like, fifty years from now, there was
going to be no Union Beach anyway, if you watch that movie. I'm like, Wait a
minute, I'm like a football field from, so--what was the question? Senior moment.
00:20:00
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: That's okay. I said, do you think that the storm changed
your views, environmentally?
DEBORAH KIMM: Well, it must have because I actually really experienced--thank
God my sister had her friend's family--really being homeless. You know, you're
one hurricane away from being homeless, or--so that I wasn't prepared for.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay. Okay. Do you think that the storm had an impact on the
presidential election, taking into account that, you know, there was a lack of
power, people's voting places--
DEBORAH KIMM: Yeah, I know it has to have, you know, an impact, because you have
people that--my neighbor across the street, she had just redid her whole house,
and she was counting on her house to be her retirement.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: And now, trust me, she's very political, so I don't know how she's
00:21:00viewed, like, what the politics are going on, but the people that were really
affected--like, I'm not married, I have no children, but the people that it
really changed their lives in a way, forever, you know, there are really bad
hardships out there for the regular people.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay. Do you think that there will be a different impact on
the governor election in 2013?
DEBORAH KIMM: Yeah, I would assume there would be, because these people--as I
said, I don't have children that I have to, like, really have--I need that house
to keep my children go to college, that kind of thing. And it's going to have an
effect because if they don't help these people, they're not going to vote them in.
00:22:00
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Right. Okay. Is there a word of advice from one, I guess you
could say, homeowner to another, in Moore, Oklahoma, what would that word of
advice be, given that they just suffered a devastation themselves?
DEBORAH KIMM: Wow. Hm. That's a hard one, because--what are they called? My
friend and I call them, we call them transitional periods. My friend--Oprah
calls them--but something that, it happens, it just turns your life upside down
and you have to start all over again. I mean, it just, it's like the odds, like
so many people, there are people that go through life, nothing happens to them.
I met a couple of these people. And then I tell people about my car experiences
00:23:00and other stuff and it's like, well, you know. I just feel very bad, I mean, I
don't know--you have to try to hang in there and cope.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Um-hm.
DEBORAH KIMM: You know, you have to--well, my mother always believed in fate,
and she always believed in God. And somehow, you have to--you have to survive
this. And especially if you have children, or something to really be here for.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Right.
DEBORAH KIMM: But it's, you know, I already had lost everything by the time this
thing happened, you know what I'm saying? My sister wanted me out of the house
and, as I said, it wasn't my home anymore. But I'm going to miss my neighbors
and his little boys, they were so cute. And it was a nice little, like it was
00:24:00down the street, it was almost in a dead-end. It will always be my home, but in
a way--I told my brother, I said, "In a way, it's kind of cathartic that the
house is coming down, because nobody else will live in that house." I know
that's kind of a weird statement to make, but it's like washing away a clean slate.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay.
DEBORAH KIMM: You know?
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: I understand. Do you think that the storm has a legacy or a
central message? What would that be?
DEBORAH KIMM: Well, Roseanne Roseannadanna said, "It's always something." Like
my cousins, or my estranged cousins, they laugh at what we consider a snowstorm.
My friend in Florida is always getting hurricanes. You know, you have
earthquakes. It's basically, your fate, kind of. It's kind of fate because my
00:25:00father, he worked at a chemical company that--he lost his car, it blew up,
right? And here he (unintelligible) himself out, because he wants to not die,
and then he ends up having a heart attack. You know, it's like fate. Like you
try to escape it and--I don't watch those--there's that movie, Final Destination
or something, where no matter what you do--
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: You can't escape.
DEBORAH KIMM: --it's going to get you. But in a way, it changes--it grounds you
more. Like you say, Hey, this is living, I have to live each day, I have to
survive. And people have been through worse. Like my boyfriend, his parents are
from Europe. His mother's French and his father, you know, was ten when he went
to a concentration camp. They lost all their family. The mother came home one
00:26:00day, she lived in Paris, and her father--they were taking them away and her
father goes, "Go away, little girl, I don't know you." And to me, it's like,
this is nothing compared to what my friend's parents think about survival.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Um-hm. Okay, so is there anything else that you'd like to
share that I possibly missed?
DEBORAH KIMM: Well it's hard to say, because it's like, whatever--like you know,
if you bring an umbrella, it doesn't rain. (laughs) But as I said, that Final
Destination, it's--you can try to run away from it, but--you know, the
interesting thing is that people are raising their houses like seventeen feet
where I am, that's going to be. But my mother would have been ninety now. And
I'm thinking, she would have to shrink for me to get her up nineteen--even I'm
00:27:00getting old for that. So it's changing the whole complex of Union Beach.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Um-hm.
DEBORAH KIMM: Like one time we went to see a movie about fifteen years ago. Jude
Law was in it, and Katherine Turner. And I remember during intermission, there
was these little biddies--I wasn't a biddy yet--but the little biddies behind
me, and they said, Oh, there's a town right by the waters, they called my town
Hooterville. And I couldn't stop laughing, (laughs) I couldn't stop laughing, I
thought it was funny. Then when I told my friends after, they were like, Oh they
were real upset. And I go, That's not even your town, what are you getting upset
about? I thought it was funny. But you know, Union Beach could be a really nice
beach community, you know, if you could turn around and just be more chichi or
something. So, you never know.
TRUDI-ANN LAWRENCE: Okay. All right. Thank you.
DEBORAH KIMM: All right--
00:28:00
end of interview
