Northern NSW. Both beautiful and fierce, much like Naomi herself, with a bit of a thing for lush wild gardens, chooks and '50s party wear. Also dogs. Naomi lives about 10 minutes out of town, with an army of women in her near neighbourhood.

We could read and hear there would be heavy rains, and most probably floods, but no one knew at that stage how bad it would be. Certainly not the weather forecasters. So I worried and I called and she was pretty brief on the phone, because who knew how long the electricity would last. She's a brand new grandma (congratulations on choosing an excellent matriarch, baby Anouk). A brand new grandma and the charge on her phone are not easily parted.

But at least one bloke had a pretty good idea about what was to come. John Taylor is 42 and lives in a small flat in the centre of Lismore. He works permanent part-time at the Woollies, at the deli counter. His mum Betty is one of the most effective campaigners against domestic violence I've ever come across and you can see, from mother to son, the deep vein of connection, of friendship even with those who are not friends. Yet.

Anyhow, I mention John because, last Wednesday, while everyone was talking heavy rains, he was talking heavy lifting. He put a post on Facebook to all his mates, to pass on to all their mates, that he was available to help locals move their possessions to higher ground. Young. Strong. And very able. It's like he knew something was coming.

While all that was going on in northern NSW, much further north from me, Cyclone Debbie was trashing the Queensland coast. Among those in the communities affected by the storms were two researchers, Wendy Madsen and Cathy O'Mullan, from Central Queensland University. Late last year, they released research on community resilience after natural disasters.

What really works to help a community bounce back? Social connectedness and optimism, among other things. And those attributes are established over a long time.

John's garage is filled with other people's belongings right now. He was helping people move their precious items as soon as the rains began. On Monday morning when I spoke to him, hadn't slept much for five days.

It was his message that really alerted Naomi and her friends. "It hadn't even been raining that much when he put that post up," she said.

She went to work Thursday morning but, by 11am, the sky outside was black and the rain was teeming. Her boss told her to go home. She went via the shops and said there wasn't any panic buying going on.

But Thursday night came and Naomi's home was cut off. The rising waters came up, first to her garden, up her front path, then up her first step. Then up her second. She bundled her large, loud, damp dog, Sadie, into the house, who really just wanted to jump through all those puddles. She bundled the chickens on to the verandah. And waited.

John Taylor, Naomi Worrall and all their many connections just kept an eye, an ear and a Facebook notification on each other. The little red dots endless mounting were just a way of saying either "help" or "we're safe" or, sometimes, "I'm here and I'm frightened".

Naomi didn't sleep on Thursday night. "There was just this roaring sound and the blackness of it all. And the river has never come anywhere near me, it never has."

The State Emergency Services sent her a text to evacuate but, when she called the number, she said she felt safe. She'd triaged herself into a less-needy category.

"There had to be more pressing matters than mine. The water just kept coming up and up and I was checking Facebook, checking the BOM and waiting for daylight. If I tried to lie down, there was still this roaring sound."

When daylight came on Friday, this scene came into focus. A horse was poking its head over her fence (yes, the horse survived). The waters peaked on Friday and Naomi's power disappeared.

Meanwhile, her social networks came checking on her, over the phone, online, by text. By Sunday, Sadie was allowed to run around the sodden yard. Linda arrived to help build a brand new chook run.

And Lismore began to return to normal. Naomi mightn't hear from John for a while. He's only going back to work on Wednesday because there are still people all over North Lismore needing help to lift and move and wash away the mud.

Much of what's left behind looks like a toddler has gone nuts. The water has thrown all aside as it pushed through homes and gardens.

But on Sunday afternoon, a whole lot of people ate homemade pizza in Naomi's kitchen, connected by not much more than love of others, a natural disaster and the strongest social networks. More than those hundreds of little red notifications. But including those very things.

Jenna Price is a columnist for The Canberra Times and Daily Life and a senior lecturer in journalism at the University of Technology, Sydney.

Twitter: @JennaPrice

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