A day in our life: Tornado

Today is B's last day that he has to report to school. It has been a long hard year. Tomorrow he will be able to get some rest for a few days before his summer practice starts. The girls are going to Gaga's for the weekend. We are going to lay around in the pool and take lots of naps. At least this is what we were thinking at around 4:00 p.m. today. Mother Nature had different plans.

I was cooking dinner when B got home. I had left early as they were predicting some storms. Nothing new for May in Oklahoma. B came in and turns on the TV to watch the weather coverage. We were both very close to the May 3, 1999 tornado so we are generally extra cautious. Let me rephrase that... B is extra cautious, I was excited about some Stove Top Stuffing. So... B is going crazy. 'It is close. I think we need to go to my parents.' I was admittedly rolling my eyes thinking he was overreacting. At 4:30 or so we pack up the girls and head over to the parents house. B is still pacing like a madman. We all go down to the cellar. We were listening to the radio. It is close. It is in the town. It is near our house. The radio is dead. Cell phones not working. We wait.

After about 20 minutes we figure it is safe and go back upstairs to see what happened. The TV is reporting on a seperate tornado that touched down near the city. Nothing on our town. I finally get a text through to my sister who tells me where there is damage. It isn't a good report. The damage is right near our house and judging by the path it would have taken to get there, it went through our house. B and I head out to see if we still have a home. I also forgot to mention that while in the cellar we suddenly remember our dog is chained up to a tree in the back yard. He had been digging pretty badly lately so he was in trouble.

As we got closer and closer to our house we are noticing more and more cars. We enter our neighborhood and the closer we get to our house the more damage we are seeing in the neighborhood. My heart is racing. I'm worried about Kobe, I'm worried about our home. We turn the corner and it is there. Our house is there. Trees are down but it is there. I run into the house and out the back and Kobe is there. I didn't realize the fence was down but the neighbor could see in and she said 'He is a little shaken but he is ok. We checked on him when we got out of the house and he is ok.'

After talking to more and more neighbors it seems that the tornado actually formed in our neighborhood. It had not yet reached a large size so we were very lucky. There was a death in the trailer park behind us. I've also watched video since this happened and no believe that our dear dog Kobe may have been airborne for a short time. It may be a good thing that he was on a chain or he could be half way to Missouri by now. The pictures are those taken as we arrived at the house.