Zumbro Falls man speaks out after fire - KTTC Rochester, Austin, Mason City News, Weather and Sports

ZUMBRO FALLS, Minn. (KTTC) -- After a fire destroyed his home Wednesday, Lee Swanson struggles to find the words to describe what he's feeling.

"I'm just trying to take everything in, trying to figure out what I'm going to do from here," Swanson said.

He received the life-changing phone call while working. It was thanks to the quick-thinking of neighbors that fire crews made it to the scene when they did.

"Never. I would never have pictured it," he said.

Despite their efforts now all that's left is just a shell of the house he grew up in and eventually bought from his parents.

Lee describes what's left saying, "There's a lot of things that are just burnt up and I got a little piece of this or a little piece of that but there's nothing good."

What was home at the beginning of the week, now is 35 years of history destroyed.

"There's nothing left on the inside. The walls are standing but that's about it. Everything's gone," Swanson said.

Lee is just taking it one step at a time. For now he's staying in a hotel.

"It was a place that I called home," he said.

Never more real than now for Lee, is the saying 'home is where the heart is.'

There's still no word on what may have started the blaze.

If you'd like to help him out, there is an account set up in Lake City at Federal Bank under his name, Lee Swanson.