“Someday I’m going to drive that truck.”

In 1997, as the dikes broke in Grand Forks, North Dakota, and water flowed across the town and inside homes, people like Mickie Mohs had to flee.

“We ended up leaving during the night about midnight because the water started coming up the street and we didn’t want to be stuck there with our son in a wheelchair and not be able to get out.”

In her view, they ‘got lucky’ because the water stopped short of flooding their entire home. The basement was lost, and the family spent days emptying and mucking it out in the freezing cold of April.

“Well, the cool thing is, and I’ll cry because I cry every damn time, we were cleaning and I looked up the street because I heard something, and it was very quiet in those days because we got in fairly early, and the Red Cross truck was coming down the street.”

The truck carried meals to people in the neighborhood where most were too busy to think much about what or where they could eat. Mickie asked the relief team how much money they wanted for the food, especially because she needed meals for family members and neighbors who were helping them.

“I’m like, I’m going to have to find some cash. And they’re like, no, this is all free. So, we’re all crying because these people are feeding us warm food and we’re so excited and it was good.”

The truck returned over the coming days. The experience stuck with Mickie. She made a promise to herself. “I always said, someday I’m going to drive the truck and I’m going to go feed somebody else who needs that.”

And she did. It took a long time. In fact, decades went by. Her husband and son passed. And yet the promise to herself remained and after finding new love and retiring she fulfilled it in 2024 when she drove a Red Cross truck to help people affected by Hurricane Helene in the southern states.

Now, learning how to drive the truck and everything that comes with it took some training, but once completed it was more a matter of resolve that helped Mickie turn the ignition key and hit the road when the call to help came.

“I sat and sat and asked – is it time? Is this a good thing for me to go? I decided, yeah, I’ve got two weeks right now. This will work. This is what I want to do.”

Red Cross relief trucks operate in teams of two. Mickie picked up her teammate in Minneapolis and the pair rolled on to North Carolina and Georgia, where they worked long days loading and delivering supper mostly for people gathering at community centers. In one case, the local partner asked Mickie to back in the truck.

“I’m like, I don’t back up. I don’t back up. He says, ’Yes you can Mickie,’ in his southern accent. And so, yes, I backed up. It was fine. And by the end, I was backing in like a champ.”

Being on the delivery side of disaster relief deepened Mickie’s understanding of the impact. It was, she says, about a whole lot more. “You offer hope. And acknowledge that somebody cares, and they’re not going through it alone. It’s not, you know, it’s not just food.”

Story by Lynette Nyman – Red Cross Minnesota and Dakotas Region. Learn more and get involved at RedCross.org/MNDAKS.