Aaron Graves – A Key To Normalcy

Claudia Henock 0:05
Hi everyone! Welcome to Your Most Precious Thing, the show that talks about the stories behind the items we hold near and dear to our hearts. I am your host, Claudia Henock. And let’s meet our guest for this week.

Claudia Henock 0:19
A few years ago, Aaron Graves was just a regular guy in his home when he heard a knock at the door. Seven minutes later, with his wallet in his hand, his whole life changed when his house burned down due to the cigarette ashes from a nearby trashcan. Today, Aaron talks about his experience of surviving the house fire and the lessons he has learned along the way.

Claudia Henock 0:42
So hi, Aaron! Welcome to the show today! How’s it going today?

Aaron Graves 0:46
It’s going pretty good. Having a good day. How you doing today?

Claudia Henock 0:50
I’m doing pretty well, actually. So to start this pilot episode, what would you say is your most precious thing?

Aaron Graves 1:01
My most precious thing is my wallet.

Claudia Henock 1:05
Can you explain the story behind it?

Aaron Graves 1:08
All right, well, the reason my wallet is my most precious thing, because it has my identification card in it. Not anymore, but I used to have my social security card in it. So for me, you can’t do anything in life without an ID. You can’t get anywhere, you can’t buy anything, really. Or if you lose anything, you can’t get it back without an ID. So my wallet is closer to me, because my, I feel like my social security card and my identification card is the same thing. It’s like, you, without that, who are you?

Claudia Henock 1:47
Okay. Can you tell a story of a time where your wallet became like, super, super important to you? I already know the story a little bit because of our past conversations, but..

Aaron Graves 1:59
Okay , well…

Claudia Henock 2:00
Do you want to tell the audience about it?

Aaron Graves 2:02
Yeah, sure. Before this situation, my wallet wasn’t the most important thing to me. But in 2000, January of 2017, my home caught on fire. And, you know, a lot of people don’t know, you know, when your house catches on fire, you know, you think that you can grab a lot of different things. But you really can’t, depending on the situation. In this situation, I couldn’t grab a lot. Only thing I was able to grab was my wallet. I lost all my furniture, all my clothes, everything that I had to my name, I lost. But inside my wallet was my identification card and my social security card, and all my debit and credit cards. So I was able to still buy things, I was still able to get room and board at a hotel.

Aaron Graves 2:54
Because without that wallet, if that wallet would have burned, I wouldn’t have had any access to anything, I wouldn’t have been able to go to the ATM, I wouldn’t have been able to even go to the bank without my identification card or any social security card. And you’re, it’s even harder to get a new social security card if you don’t have ID. So that is why my wallet is my most precious item. I go everywhere with it. Like I said, every time I use it, it was in my wallet every day. Without it, I guess there’s no me.

Claudia Henock 3:28
Yeah. When we first started planning the episode, when I was first talking about how I wanted to start of the podcast, when you had asked me like what kind of was like the main question, the original prompt concept I had was, “If your house caught on fire and all your loved ones, all your pets, all your important documents came out, what was the one thing that you would grab?” And you actually really surprised me when you mentioned like, “Hey, I was in that same exact situation.” Do you get a lot of questions from people who were surprised that you went through that type of situation?

Aaron Graves 4:03
Yeah, because even though we see it on TV a lot, a lot of people have never experienced their home actually catching on fire, let alone losing all their most precious belongings. One of the first questions people ask me when they hear that my house had caught on fire, the first thing they say, “Well, what did you grab? Or how did it happen?” It’s one of those things where you really only see on TV, or you see on the news, or wherever. You don’t actually, I didn’t know anyone prior to this that had their home burnt down. So I do get a lot of, “Wow,” you know, and I do get a lot of, “I’m glad you made it out safe.”

Claudia Henock 4:43
Yeah.

Aaron Graves 4:44
So it’s one of those situations where it just makes you more humbled to be alive, makes you, you know, live life a little different, you know?

Claudia Henock 4:53
Absolutely. So what would you say is like the most common, like misconceptions people have when you survive a situation like this, that you you have come across from people?

Aaron Graves 5:04
I think the most common misperception is that all you got to do is get out and run. A lot of people think it’s easy to get out of a house fire. A lot of people assume that they know what they would have grabbed. Now, a lot of people assume that it takes a long time for a house to burn down. My house burned down in like, seven minutes.

Claudia Henock 5:26
Oh God!

Aaron Graves 5:27
Yeah, oxygen fuels fires. So a lot of people just don’t know. It’s kind of like that with anything in life. You know, people don’t know, they just have different opinions, or what they would think, but not too many people have been in that situation. So misconception, perception is you can just grab whatever, you really can’t.

Claudia Henock 5:51
It’s kind of like a mix of adrenaline, like when you’re in that situation?

Aaron Graves 5:56
Yeah,

Claudia Henock 5:57
It’s like common thought, like goes out and you’re like, “I want to survive. I want to get my family. I want my pets out.” It’s just I want to survive type deal.

Aaron Graves 6:03
Honestly, it’s not even that. Like you really have, I had so many thoughts going through my head at once. It was unreal. Like I couldn’t, your heart is racing, You’re sweating. You’re nervous. You’re scared. You’re just everywhere. Like, in a house fire. You don’t, I wouldn’t say you even have one complete thought.

Claudia Henock 6:24
Yeah.

Aaron Graves 6:25
It’s really one of those things. You’re having so many thoughts per second. That it’s hard to even think, like you’re just thinking so much, if that makes sense. It’s hard to actually stop one of the thoughts and go, “Oh this is what I need to do.” It’s not like that. It’s scary. And not to even know what’s really going on is even scarier.

Claudia Henock 6:47
What would you say was kind of like the most scariest moment about that experience. Like either during the actual fire itself, or like afterwards?

Aaron Graves 6:56
The most scariest part for me was that I was in the house when it was burning down. Like I had no idea it was on fire. That was probably the scariest part, you know, someone knocking on your door, telling you that your house is on fire while you’re actually inside the house.

Claudia Henock 7:12
Oh, god.

Aaron Graves 7:12
Yeah, that was crazy. Because if that guy didn’t knock on the door, I may have not been able to get out. That was probably the scariest part for me.

Claudia Henock 7:23
I guess. Life sometimes it’s just like, really weird. And you just really don’t know what people have gone through, sometimes?

Aaron Graves 7:30
You don’t. That’s why in life, you know, it’s easier said than actually done. But it’s, you know, we’re people, you know, we’re creatures, you know, it’s hard not to judge. It’s hard not to sometimes it’s not even judging, it’s just you thinking the wrong thing, and it turns out that you’re judging the person, Not intentionally meaning to do that, you know, we all have thought just based off the seeing things. Yeah, it’s hard to know what someone goes through. That’s why you just, the most famous saying, just treat people how you want to be treated. And you do that, depending on what kind of person you are, things should go your way.

Claudia Henock 8:08
If there’s someone listening to the show right now, that has been through house fire, what advice would you give to someone who’s been in that situation.

Aaron Graves 8:16
To someone, that has like, had their house completely burned down and lost everything, I lost everything. So to someone like that, I would just tell them keep going. It gets better, my house burned down, and now I live in a four bedroom house. So you know, it gets better, don’t let it define who you are. Don’t let it scare you. As a person, just don’t let it keep you from being who you are, you know, everyone goes through tramatic experiences, you know, everybody just has their own story. So don’t ever feel like you’re just the only one going through something, or that has went through something, you know. Just try to, you’ve already made it through it, so just whatever the case may be, just try to learn from it, and just move on.

Claudia Henock 9:08
That’s definitely really great to hear as well, because you just never know what people have gone through. And even if a bunch of people go through the same exact experience, it can be all different.

Aaron Graves 9:19
Me and you could be in the same exact room, and the same exact thing happens to us, but it can still be a total different experience for you versus me. One because you’re female, one because I’m male, just one because we think different, because we are different. And there’s a lot of different reasons, but every situation is like that. You know, everybody is their own person, so each experience is each person’s own experience.

Claudia Henock 9:48
That’s all really great, that’s, I didn’t realize I would get this deep in this episode first thing, but it’s a really, but for me, I feel like your story is really important to tell for this first episode, actually.

Aaron Graves 10:04
I would just tell people: Be mindful of your smoker. Be mindful of where you throw your ashes. If you have a fireplace in your home, be mindful of the ashes. Make sure that ashes are fully out before you dispose of them. I will also tell people be mindful when you’re in a kitchen, anything that can cause a fire, just be mindful of those things. Especially if you’re not living alone. And just understand that fires are so easy to start, a little fire in the trash can is what burned my house down. A cigarette butt that was thrown in a trash can. After like 30 minutes in a trash, it caught on to the side of my house. And it was an accident, my neighbor’s accident. But, like I said, you got to be mindful of those things. And you just never know, like, everything in life is unpredictable, so.

Claudia Henock 11:04
Yeah, absolutely. Well, Aaron, it’s been our honor of having you be the first guest on Your Most Precious Thing. Before we end this interview for today, is there any social media, or websites that people can follow you on online if you want people to know more about you?

Aaron Graves 11:25
Want to know more about me? You could follow me on Snapchat. I believe it’s, I don’t even remember my snapchat name. I really don’t remember my snapchat name, but on Instagram. My name is wow, I don’t even know my Instagram name.

Claudia Henock 11:46
You’re totally fine. We can always include that info in the show notes as well.

Aaron Graves 11:50
I don’t really, I’m on social media, but not really. I have so much, it’s so much life to live. You know, it’s like, I don’t, why live it through social media, you know, just live it. You know, because I learned that in a fire as well. Like, just live life like, cause the one thing that’s guaranteed is death. And as harsh as that may sound, everyone is going to die. So when none of us know when, none of us know how, none of us know why, that’s just a part of life. So with that being said, live it! Because you only get one life. You can make as many mistakes as you want. You can do whatever you want. Because you get one life. It doesn’t matter how someone else wants you to live life. You live your life the way that you want to live it, because it’s your life, while you have it. l will leave you guys with that.

Claudia Henock 12:50
Aaron, I want to say thank you again for being on the pilot episode. It’s an honor to interview you for a show like this as well. So I want to say thank you.

Aaron Graves 13:00
Thank you so much, Claudia.

Claudia Henock 13:01
Thank you for listening to this episode of Your Most Precious Thing. If you want to follow the podcast, you can follow me on Instagram @claudiahenock or Claudia Henock on LinkedIn. You can also follow the podcast through my official website, www.claudiahenock.com, or anywhere where you can listen to your podcasts. Intro and Outro Music is Synapse by Shane Ivers, and you can find his music on www.silvermansound.com.