I am 16 years old from Vidor, Texas. When I first heard about Hurricane Rita, I thought, \"Oh this isnt going to be bad.\" Then I heard more and more about it and how bad it was going to be. I started getting scared and started crying because I was scared I might not get to see my friends again and I kept thinking, \"What if I lose my house? What am I going to do? Where am I going to stay? What school will I go to? Will I make new friends?\" It was a really scary situation. I never in my life thought I would experience something like this. My mom is the manager at Dollar General here in Vidor and at first, the big boss said they couldnt leave. So my mom was telling me that I would have to leave with my brother. On a normal day, it would usually take us maybe 2 hours if that, to get to my aunts house in Montgomery, Texas on Lake Conroe. When they called for a manditory evacuation, I was a little happy because I knew my mom was getting to go with us. We drove 26 hours to my aunts house. We were on the road with thousands of other cars full of scared people. My dad stayed back and then finally realized he needed to get out. So the next day, while we were still on the road, my dad called and told us he was behind us, coming with us. We got to my aunts house where it was safe. I somewhat enjoyed being away because I didnt have to go to school but then again, I wanted to be with my friends. I didnt know where most of my friends were and every night, I would cry and pray that they were somewhere safe. Finally, when it was all over, we went back to Vidor to see the damage, a few days later. When I seen it, it was horrifying. I had never in my life seen something like that. I was in total shock. When we drove into my neighbor hood, it looked worse than anything. Trees were down everywhere. I couldnt believe it. We had two trees in my front yard, and both of them were on our house. My house was camaflouged. We went and looked at all the damages done to our house and our yard, and the results werent as bad as others. The trees landed on our porch. Our fence was gone, our shed was gone, and we had a tree in our pool. We were lucky it didnt do more. But it was an experience I can tell my kids, and grandkids.