Late in January, I flew to Atlanta to be with my Uncle Herman and Aunt Mary, who were both hospitalized. I spent my time at the hospital talking with my aunt and playing country classics for my uncle, who was on life support. At midnight on January 28, my uncle passed away. Just four hours after that, while I was in Atlanta asleep, my neighbor Lalo called to tell me that a fire had started at the house under construction next door and had spread to my mother’s home. Another neighbor, Raphael, had to carry my mother out of the house because she is on oxygen and lacked the strength to get down the stairs herself. She was taken to the ER as a precaution.

Initially, the photos Lalo sent in the dark made the damage look manageable, but once my friends Claudia and Doug Bayless picked my mom up from the hospital and reached the property, Doug told me plainly that the house was gone. The fire was so hot that it destroyed both of our vehicles, the riding lawn mower, and caused a generator to explode. Everything in the storage shed was vaporized, and nearly everything inside the house was lost to fire, water, soot, and smoke. When I returned to Houston, I realized the house was completely uninhabitable. My mother stayed with Raphael for a few days before moving in with church friends, Barry and Toni, who had a master suite set up for elder care.

The situation became even more difficult when I discovered that my mother had inadvertently canceled her homeowners insurance in 2025. She had moved her car insurance to Geico to save money and somehow ended up with no coverage on the house she had insured for thirty years. This meant there was no money for the house or for the ten thousand dollar exterior lift and the custom walk-in shower she had just installed months prior. The trauma of the fire and displacement caused my mother’s health to decline rapidly. Her oxygen levels dropped so low that she had to be hospitalized and then spent twenty days in rehab at Encompass. Eventually, my siblings and I arranged for her to move into a residential care home.

Upon my return from Atlanta, my neighbors Lalo and Mary took me in immediately, and I stayed at their house for nearly a month. It was a massive blessing to have their support during such a dark time. Lalo took the lead on the rebuild early on, sourcing materials from kind donors while his brother Victor did the foundation work and reframed the roof. However, after that first month, Lalo began to lose strength in his grip and upper body. He was eventually hospitalized and placed in a coma; he has an autoimmune disease attacking his spine and his vision. When Lalo went to the hospital, the work slowed down significantly and then came to a solid three-week pause as we took time to regroup. During that time, I hired a contracting crew to get the momentum back. We have funded the work using eleven thousand dollars from a GoFundMe, thirteen thousand dollars from an auto insurance claim, and twenty thousand dollars my mother took from her retirement.

During the construction, I severed a tendon in my right index finger on some sheet metal while helping on the roof. I had to have surgery, but my recovery has been successful enough that I am back to playing guitar. About two weeks ago, my dog Nina was shot in the shoulder by a neighbor with a revolver. I had to pay four thousand dollars for emergency surgery, but she survived the wound and is doing well. I am still living in the house in the one room that was spared, using fans at night to deal with the heat. The house is slowly being enclosed with plywood, Hardie board, and prefab windows, and the crew is now working to rebuild the back wall. Labor and materials cost about sixty-five hundred dollars a week, and I am down to my last two weeks of funding. A plumber is helping for free, and I am negotiating with electricians to keep costs down. My goal remains getting the house ready for my mother to return, hopefully in time for her 80th birthday on May 23.

I have been inspired not only by the incredible kindness of those around me, but by my own ability to remain calm and centered through this storm. I attribute that resilience to years of deep therapy and personal growth. Today, my mom is comfortable in her current care, and my sweet baby Nina is walking almost as if nothing ever happened. Through every challenge of this rebuild, I am learning constantly and putting into practice the lessons from the many greater men and women I have learned from. I am just trying to do the right thing by my mother and get her back home.

Please Pray Gerardo "Lalo" Chaparro to get well and back home to his wife and baby Little G.