A fan in the garage spread the scent of bleach at Joe Bailey’s home on Sara Jane Road.

“Oh man, we’ve got a mess. You’ll have to excuse the house. It looks like a hurricane hit us,” Bailey said about the home he and wife, Doris, have shared 53 years.

When his son, Joe Jr. told him Ike sent several feet of water got into his house, Bailey hightailed it home from Leeseville, La. to start ripping out carpets and hauling couches over to the trash heap. He said he’s washed the walls and floors with bleach ten times to keep the mold out.

“I’ve got to scrub some more,” he said. “I’m not worried about her getting sick. I’ve sterilized everything.”

The pair seemed fairly tuckered out, but calm about their prospects. Sara Jane Road is the legendary title for what’s East Port Neches Avenue on one side and turns into the Pure Atlantic Highway neighborhoods of Groves and Port Arthur. Bailey is on the Port Arthur side, surrounded by neighbors airing out most of their household contents in their yards. Neighbors on the Port Neches side have better reports from Ike.

Bailey can see the Rainbow and Veterans Memorial bridges from his back yard and used to keep his boat in the water behind his house, until Rita got the pier. He said he’s never had water damage like this. A brick worker, he built his home and said he plans to stay put.

“I’m gonna keep going. I haven’t got time to tear down and rebuild,” he said.

He seems a little bit more concerned over the loss of keepsakes than his wife. He sipped from her mug depicting Elvis’ birthplace as he surveyed saved scrapbooks and documents, such as a Groves Junior High School certificate. He bemoaned losing pictures.

“I didn’t lose all of them from the Korean War, but I lost a lot of ‘em, and her letters … she wanted to save them,” he said.

A black ‘62 Chevy truck in the yard also tugged on his emotions

“Now I wish that hadn’t got under water,” he said.

Doris said they used to date in that truck, but that, like the mementos, are just things, she said.

“It breaks your heart to see it all, but it’s just something you have to give up,” she said.

Kenneth Jones talked to a FEMA representative in his garage, with blue tarp covering what he’d hauled out of his house.

“I don’t even know if I want to start over again,” said Joe Bailey’s neighbor.

He and fiancé Thomasine Oliver had just purchased new couches, which needed to be replaced after Rita.

“Now they’re not even worth a flip,” he said.

Craig Melancon said he doesn’t even know how to spell Ike.

That’s his joke about the time from when he lost power until weeks later — he hasn’t monitored news coverage.

Melancon is general manager of Broussard’s Mortuaries. He lives on Sara Jane Road’s East Port Neches Avenue side and didn’t suffer damage, like those on down the Groves side, he said.

“The water was four feet from getting over the road,” he said he heard. “A neighbor has a pond. He said he could drive a boat from his pond to Lake Charles without ever stopping.”

He spent Ike night at the Silsbee mortuary. Roger Hensley, Brent Aimsworth and Joe Raiborn, Broussard’s staffers, spent it at the Nederland Broussard’s on 12th Street. That site got “a little water leak on the second floor,” Melancon said.

“We felt in Hardin County just the same winds we felt over here,” he said. “On Saturday morning we cleaned up (in Nederland). Other than losing power, we were really nice and lucky and fortunate.”

Doug Anderson said he was knocking on wood as he pressure washed love bugs off the red truck he used to evacuate his Port Neches home. He got help from is son, Trent.

Legendary Sara Jane Road is a hot spot for ghost stories during Halloween, but this September Anderson was happy to find it calm.

He pointed out neighbors’ homes between to lake areas and said he’d heard there was very little damage.

Knock on wood,” he said.

Contact this reporter at ddoiron@panews.com.