Tonight we had a scare. Generally speaking, I love storms. The flashes of lightening & rumbling thunder is cool to me. I like rainy weather, too! Driving in a storm doesn't really bother me either because I'm always super careful. (of course, you've still got to watch out for the crazies!!) Tonight was a little different.
About 5:55, I pointed to the clock & reminded Larry that it was time to take Savannah to church for youth group. He took her. It wasn't raining or doing much of anything at the time. It had sprinkled off & on for a few hours, but aside from that, nothing seemed remotely "threatening" about the weather at that time. When Larry left, I checked my email. A friend on Facebook asked how the weather was here. She'd seen something about tornadoes on the weather, so she knew our area was getting some storms. I told her we were fine & explained that according to our news station, there was a bad storm...with the potential for a tornado....but it was in a town nearly an hour away & it was headed away from us. I really wasn't concerned.
Larry got back home about 6:25 & sat down to watch something on TV and called for me to come look at the screen. There on the screen was something about like this.
Tornadoes. All around us. The worst part of the storm at that time was headed for the general direction of our church! My baby was there! I immediately said "I think we need to go get Savannah." Larry nodded in agreement so I grabbed my keys & cell phone & shot out the door. I felt a little like Grandma Thora in this episode of Arthur. (just watch the first minute & 1/2 of this video & you'll get the idea.)
Although logically it was probably not the best idea to go out in the middle of an oncoming tornado, I wanted to get my baby home! Thankfully, due to the storm, most of the area was taking cover, so the roads were clear! I prayed & sang an old church song that I learned when I was a kid all the way there. It was the only thing I could think of to keep me from panicking & getting overly freaked out. I kept having this visuals of my car being blown off the road or picked up & dropped on top of a house or something! Come on, folks...I've seen the Wizard of Oz....I know what a tornado looks like! Ha ha!
I think I turned into the church parking lot on 2 wheels trying to hurry up & get to my baby girl. When I pulled up, the youth pastor was on the porch of the youth building with his laptop watching the storm system progress on the same news station we were watching at home. As I approached him, he pointed me to the hallway where all of the youth group was taking cover. I got Savannah from the line of kids & headed back to the car pronto! I didn't want to waste time waiting for things to get better (or worse!) so we jumped in the car and took off! As soon as we got on the road, I called Larry to tell him I was headed home. When I told him what road I was on, he advised me where to turn off & get out of harm's way. He said I was right in the middle of where the strong part of the storm was hitting at that time! If I turned north, I would've driven right into the storm, so I turned south & drove away from it to get home. Thankfully I could've gone either direction to get home, so choosing one route over wasn't a problem. As soon as we hung up, I told Savannah that I had sung all the way to the church to get her & she said "I was just thinking that it would be a good idea." She reached over & took my hand and we sang Jesus Loves Me over & over the entire drive home! I think we were both terrified but made the best of the situation.
When we got home, Samuel was in his bedroom floor, hugging a pillow, rocking & crying. He was scared to death after hearing the word 'tornado' on the news. Sarah was sitting by Larry watching the weather on the news, but he had retreated to his room to work on his homework. Poor kiddo was in there alone & seeing all the lightening out his windows and just completely panicked. :(
Not 5 minutes after we got home, the weather guy announced that a "rotation in the storm system" (aka: tornado!) had been spotted at the intersection of 2 highways. Those roads are 1 mile from the church where I'd picked Savannah up!!!!!! Thank goodness I brought her home!
The whole thing ended up dissipating & never really touched our neighborhood, but I must say... driving through the bad weather, hearing the storm sirens blaring at me the whole way to & fro, yikes. Scary stuff!
1 comment:
So thankful ur family was safe last nite. I know Im very thankful that they was no damage to my house or in my neighborhood last nite. It was a very scary situation. I live in Van Zandt County and the one that ripped thru Canton, is like 15 minutes from my house. The one in the Sand Flat area is maybe 20to 25 minutes from me. It basicly just went around my neighborhood. The hail and the rain was so hard. Please keep everyone from our county in ur prayers. Several ppl lost everything they own last nite due to it hitting their houses. The pictures are horrible looking but to see it in person is like WOW.
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