The moment Romulus Meares, IV, 31, of Clyde, realized his home was flooding beyond repair, with water rising to his knees, he sat down in his living room and played a final song on the piano that had been an anniversary gift to his wife and would soon be destroyed.

Meares’s family of four, with a baby on the way, was one of many to lose their home as the remnants of Hurricane Helene swept through Haywood County on September 27, 2024.

“I was sort of lucid, and I looked at the piano and I was like, ‘there’s no way I can save that,’” Meares said. “I got this for my wife on our second anniversary, so I thought, ‘I can at least record a video for her.”
The only tune Meares knew how to play was “Mad World,” a Tears for Fears song with a hauntingly fitting name for the moment and a somber melody. With his cell phone propped up to record, it would capture his final tribute to his home and piano as water flowed into his house.

“It’s a very, very Mad World.”

“In my head, I felt like God led me to that moment,” Meares said. “Here we are in this craziness that no one could expect and sure enough I know how to play this one song that explains what this entire community is going through. And sure enough, my wife’s piano is right there and I have this wild desire to play this song for her.”

Meares and his wife Leah have two children, ages 4 and 5. The family had only been in their Clyde house for two years but had plans for it to become their “forever home.” It’s easy to see why – it’s a sweet and unusual stone cottage, built in 1933 with Storybook-style architectural accents.

19 days after the storm, the destruction remains incredible. Meares’ back porch was shattered and thrown over to his neighbor’s yard, and where a Gazebo once stood in his backyard there’s now a giant sinkhole.
Like so many other Clyde families, the Meares expected their basement to flood and maybe some outdoor damage.
“No one expected five feet of water in their house,” Meares said.

On the day of the flood, Leah and the children evacuated while Meares stayed behind hoping to monitor the home and wait out the storm.

As a former Marine, Meares was determined to keep the sump pump and generator running in the basement—until the floodwaters rose so high that the basement steps disappeared into the water.

“This was like the first moment where I started having, like, a mental breakdown,” Meares said. “That’s when it clicked in my head, ‘Man, I made a mistake by staying here.’”

Wading through water up to his waist, Meares grabbed all the memorabilia he could think of and brought it upstairs to the second level of his home.

“I just kept telling myself over and over again, ‘Get the things you can’t buy,” he said. “I was just trying to put one foot in front of the other and not freak out … we just didn’t expect this.”

As the storm continued, Meares decided to document some of the flooding with his camera.
In a short video he filmed from the top of his roof, viewers can see the five feet or more of water that invaded his street and his neighbor’s homes.

“There goes the neighborhood,” he says.

Exhausted after hours of being drenched and cold and convinced that the flood waters had crested, Meares fell asleep on his daughter’s bed upstairs.

“The next thing I hear is the fire department calling out to rescue me,” he said.
The family has been staying with friends in Canton for the past two weeks, but the 4-year-old still calls the empty dwelling his “home.”

“He was probably hit the hardest by all of this,” Meares said.

Unsure of what’s next for his family, Meares is most stressed about his college education coming to an abrupt halt.
Under the GI Bill, Meares is a Mechatronics Engineering student at UNC-Asheville, but the devastating flood has set him back in his classes.

With his wife working remotely to support the family, Meares wants nothing more than to finish school on time and get a job.
“I just want to be able to catch up, complete school, and provide for my wife,” he said.

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View Meares’ videos:

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To help Mountain Projects meet the needs of flood survivors, follow this link: https://mountainprojects.org/product/campaign_2023/
Meares set up a GoFundMe account raising donations to buy his wife a new piano. If you would like to contribute, visit: https://gofund.me/3337b944
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Story produced by Buris Chalmers Communications in support of Mountain Projects.
Writing: Shelby Perusi
Editing: Bill Graham and Angie Schwab
Photos: Angie Schwab and Romulus Meares, IV