She clasps her wrinkled, weathered hands, drops to her bony knees and asks the lord to finish the job he started.

Just take me, she pleads.

Just take me.

He’ll never forget her lined face, her gutted apartment, her acceptance of a bible – her plea for death.

“Mabel,” Salvation Army Captain Jim Vanderheyden speaks her name softly, his eyes warm, his hands steady.

Recently returned from hurricane Ike’s destruction in Texas, Vanderheyden returns changed, a little more thankful, a little less sheltered, a touch harder.

For two weeks he served food in Galveston, handed out bibles, hugs, hope and solace.

Every day 7,000 residents fed from his team’s canteen, crowding the white vehicle, hands out awaiting the feel of warm plate filled with hot food, cold drink and the promise to return.

Men and women ask for extras for their little ones, humbly accepting the nourishment, carrying it carefully to makeshift shelters, feeding their offspring from plastic trays filled with spaghetti O’s and chicken stew.

He watches the crowds as they devour their meals, he sees their homes, roofs peeled off like cans of soup, front ends gaping open like giant dollhouses, belongings strewn across lawn, street and sand.

He sees their despair, their desperation, their loneliness and longing.

They’ve lost everything, he said.

Your entire life ripped from you, catapulted through the air, only to come to rest in another’s yard.

Furniture, appliances, cars, boats, utensils, pictures, bassinets and ball caps once safely contained within four walls now lay discarded, useless, broken and beaten.

He says Ike didn’t care who you were or what you owned, it took “everybody’s everything.”

People worked their entire lives to build these homes, only to watch a front-end loader scoop it up, roll down the street and dump it atop a growing pile of once-treasured items.

From the rubble they will rebuild, he said.

Until then he’ll pray for Mabel and all like her.

He said he did all he could do – then walked away.

But he now walks with a renewed sense of perspective.