To the Editor:

There’s a song lyric that reminds us of a recent event in our lives. It comes from Joni Mitchell’s 1970 hit “Big Yellow Taxi” and it goes like this: “Don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone.” The song was inspired by the natural beauty of Hawaii, and how developers destroyed the habitat responsible for drawing people to the island in the first place.

We’ve experienced our own devastation. In the early morning hours of Oct. 11, we received a call from next door that our Gardner Road home was on fire. We jumped out of a bathroom window with our dog and watched as flames and smoke swallowed 20 years of hard work and memories.

Almost nothing was spared. While the gourmet kitchen, great room, garage, camper, and pool can be replaced, the family heirlooms, photographs, and sense of familiarity ingrained in the walls left us forever on that night.

We always loved and appreciated our home. We never took it for granted. Loss is a funny thing, though. It allows you to pinpoint exactly how important something is with the kind of clarity you can’t have while it’s still around. This cut deep. We realized our home was more than a place where we lived, raised a family, and hosted countless gatherings. It was an extension of us and a physical reminder of our history.

Then it was gone. And, even though we had always cherished it, now we know exactly what we had. If all endings are the start of a new beginning, our current lives began as we stood on our front lawn and watched everything we knew disappear.

It’s been more than a month since the fire, and so many people have asked us how we’re able to stay so strong in the face of adversity. The answer to that question is as remarkable as the fire was terrible.

Our new life began with these lessons: The world is great, people are wonderful, friends are supportive, the community cares, strangers are family, firefighters are heroes, and we are loved. Our strength comes from you.

Optimism is easy in a world that reveals itself so beautifully. There are too many people to thank by name, but we want all of you to know that you’ve touched our hearts immensely.

Thank you for the call from next door. Thank you to the firefighters who risked their lives for us. Thank you to The Altamont Enterprise, Times Union, and WTEN for telling our story with such compassion.

Thank you to the firefighter who found our wedding ring in the rubble. Thank you to our brothers and sisters for your support (and the temporary lodging). Thank you to the friends who called and visited and gave us food and clothing and kept our cooler full of essentials like wine and beer.

Thank you to the neighbors and community members who we had never met before who dropped by. Thank you to the random strangers who recognized us in stores and bought us jackets and gave us discounts and more. Thank you to the demolition crew who donated your time and services to help us start over.

Thank you to the American Legion and the Altamont Fire Department for hosting benefits that will help us rebuild. Thank you to our children, their families, their friends, their co-workers, and to everyone who made donations from places as far away as the Dominican Republic.

At this stage of our lives, we never thought we’d be on this adventure. Yet here we are, starting from scratch and somehow full of more gratitude than we’ve ever felt before. That’s what happens when you can’t pull into your driveway without finding a new pair of boots or a plate of food sitting on the picnic table that serves as your makeshift command center. Many times we have no idea who these items came from. We just know how inspired they make us feel.

Our message to all of you is this: Thank you, thank you, thank you. We wish we could say it to each of your faces and we hope in time we can.

If we can make one request, please check your fire alarms and make an escape plan. We were fortunate. It didn’t have to happen this way.

And there’s that idea again — fortunate even after our greatest loss. Fortunate to have friends and family and neighbors who helped us rise when we were down. Maybe you can’t truly and fully appreciate what you’ve got till it’s gone. But we know this feels pretty good right now.

Paul and Theresa Oliver

Altamont