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Trailers
were shaken and rattled from their tied foundations like cheap carnival rides
that needed urgent repairs. Some became easily airborne before they were
smashed into smithereens.
At first, we
automatically hid inside the tornado shelter in the garage which, in retrospect,
was not such a good idea. It had thick walls that would withstand a lot of wind
power but there was a water heater in the dark, dank room with not much fresh air
coming from the garage through the slats of the very thick and heavy wood door.
It gave us a false sense of protection, I suppose, since we could easily be
subjected to scalding water if the house would be damaged.
So, we
started “hiding” into the basement where at least we had a couch to sit down on
and bookshelves with magazines and my collection of books. But it was dark, and
electricity was always the first thing to go. I never bought a generator; it
was something we could not afford to have - too expensive for the budget of a
single parent and teacher.
The power
would go out on a dime and we suffered various levels of misery – extreme heat
or extreme cold, depending how hot or how cold was outside. The temperatures
inside would reach unbearable levels in August and terrible wet and icy levels
in early spring or late fall.
We started
out with 16 majestic tall pines that the previous owner and builder had planted
in the 1950s and, in the span of fifteen years we had lost all but one to
various hurricanes, tornadoes, and straight line winds. These fallen sixty-foot trees blocked the
entire cul-de-sac, our and neighbors’ yards and required serious clearing
intervention.
During
Katrina, the entire street was blocked by significant debris and cranes had to
extricate a passage for people to be able to get out. The roots stood high in
the air and left huge craters behind after being completely pulled up like weeds
by the unimaginable force of the wind.
We were
grateful to out of state cleaning crews, food and water trucks from local
churches and neighboring Mennonites, who would show up with axes and chainsaws and
start clearing and cleaning, cutting lumber, piling it up out of the way, and
bringing a hot meal and bottled water long before the first FEMA trucks pulled
in.
We could
only imagine the additional devastation in flood areas like Louisiana where the
water surge would inundate homes up to the ceiling and having to deal with the
destruction of everything they ever owned being covered and destroyed by mud
and mold.
And the
people who survived by some miracle the devastating winds were shocked to
discover that their homes disappeared completely from the face of the earth and
they found themselves only in possession of the clothes on their backs. Digging
through the muck sometimes brought out a serendipitous family photograph that
somehow was spared and was left behind. The concrete foundations of their
former homes were the only physical evidence that the homes had ever existed in
the first place.
After days
of not being able to shower, going to the temporarily opened gyms for a shower
became a blessed luxury. Finding a room in a local hotel that finally had power
and being able to sleep in comfort again made us appreciate that much more what
we had before the power went out for days and weeks at a time.
The harder
to fill huge craters in the yard and the feeling of desolation made life that
much more depressing. It took its toll on our next-door neighbor who, after two
weeks of darkness, no heat, and living in his house like a mole, took his own
life in his bedroom.
It was so
sad that none of us knew what he was going through, he did not choose to share
his misery and despair with the rest of us, perhaps we might have been able to
save his precious life. We were all trying to survive within the confines of our
limitations. People seldom realize how quickly everything crumbles like a house
of cards without power, heat, A/C, water, and food.
We lost
count how many times the entire content of our freezers and refrigerators
spoiled after days without power, how many shorted television sets, microwaves,
and other electronic devices we had to replace, items struck by lightning or burned
out by power surges. We replaced three air conditioning units crushed by fallen
debris and large trees and four roofs in an eighteen-year period.
Once we were
shopping at the tiny local mall, three miles from our house, when all the windows
blew out by straight line winds. Another time I was driving on the highway and was
blown over on the other side of the road like a tiny toy. Luckily, there were
no other cars in sight to cause a crash.
If a tornado
hit or skimmed our town while it was cold outside, the house would become freezing
cold fast. No number of blankets or clothes would keep us warm. We even tried
to foolishly warm up with the outdoor grill which we brought inside. With no fireplace,
the fumes were too much to bear, and we gave up, opening doors to air the house
which made it that much colder.
The campus
where I worked was hit twice quite hard. Several buildings were damaged, and a
couple had to be demolished. With each tornado, more magnificent magnolia trees
were uprooted, trees that had been there for generations. A dormitory was hit
while students were huddling in their bunks and were missed by dangerous and
lethal flying debris like pieces of lamp posts, impaling their beds or living
quarters by mere inches from their bodies.
During
sudden freezes, following a heavy rain, power lines would snap like bread
sticks, and, aside from the treacherous and slippery roads, we had to contend
with live wires on the ground, and miserable cold temperatures inside. God’s
saving grace was that we still had our lives and the homes were still standing.
The ominous
dark clouds, high winds, and driving rain or hail were always replaced by
beautiful blue skies and sometimes rainbows, shining light over swaths of
devastation that had obliterated people’s lives and sometimes their very
existence. And the memory and psychological
desolation of those devastating times is still painful to this day.