Things are finally getting back to normal around our house after dealing with the storm that was oddly tagged an inland hurricane, or derecho storm, depending on which side of the proverbial storm fence you're sitting on. There were gusts of wind with speeds of over 100 mph recorded, and the wind was sustained for well over half an hour. It's hard to find official reports, but those figures are conservatively based on what I've been reading online through blogs and local news agencies. In other words, a lot of wind for a long amount of time causing a lot of damage.When the storm hit, Emily was at JALC, Rohan and Allie were at school, and I was home with Elena and Riddick. When the first part of the system came through, the storm sirens went off a couple of times, but like most storms that pass through, it's kind of like the boy who cried wolf. I think a lot of us that remember the tornado from '82 almost feel rather indifferent to storms in general, like we've been there and done that. So, after listening to some reports on W3D, and after the sirens ceased, I decided to put Riddick down for a nap. I also crashed for a short nap while Elena watched a movie. I awoke a short time later to the sounds of wind moreso than any sirens. Come to think of it, I have no recollection of any more sirens. All I could hear was wind. The door to our sleeper porch was open, and I could see the tops of all of the trees just flapping violently about like you see in hurricane video clips. Then I saw a very large branch fly through the air in perfect horizontal plane. That's when I new that things were definitely much worse than I had presumed. I quickly put on my sandals, and shouted for Elena to go the basement. She didn't really like the idea, because it was dark. I don't think it had registered with me yet that there was no power. I was still just aware of the sound of wind everywhere. Now mind you, I had no idea that this was a constant wave of wind. Around here the worst case scenario is a tornado, so that is what I thought was happening. I grabbed Riddick from his bed (which shocked the poor guy, because he was in a deep sleep), ran downstairs, and rushed the two kids down to the basement. I quickly opened up some lawn chairs for the kids to sit in and told them to sit tight while I ran back upstairs to get some stuff.
I knew that if things got really bad, as in our house being hit by a tornado, I wanted to be in pants and work boots and not shorts and sandals. For all I knew, I might have had to tear through wreckage to get my children out alive. I ran upstairs and stopped in the kitchen to look out of our breakfast nook windows just to see if I could see anything. I noticed that our neighbor's trellis had blown over across our sidewalk near our garage. I was just thinking about how that was a shame when our white vinyl fence panel exploded and disappeared. I didn't realize that I had just witnessed our neighbor Dale's tree coming down. 
I was certain that that was it --a tornado was upon us. I sprinted up the stairs, grabbed some jeans and my boots, and bolted back to the basement. I dropped the clothes to the floor, picked up my kids, sat down with them on my lap, and started praying out loud. I'm not for sure how much time passed before I decided to go check things out...probably about fifteen or twenty minutes, at least. Once again, I sat the kids in their chairs and then went upstairs to observe what might be seen. It wasn't long before I discovered that Dale's tree had fallen parallel with our house, blocking our back door. I also found that that our tree to the east had fallen against our neighbor Steve's house. 
I then ran up to my room to get a bird's eye view of what had happened, and like every idiot out there, I grabbed my camera. I filmed a very short video clip in which you can tell that my emotions were somewhat frazzled. Viewing it now, it seems a little cheesy, but at the time I wasn't much worried about how I sounded. I still didn't know what had just hit us, but I knew that we were still still alive, praise God. After my quick filming, I ran back to the basement and brought the kids up to the living room as things outside seemed to be settling down.
After the storm we were without power for six evenings. It was a test of mild inovations, but a healthy exercise in modern day domestic survival to be sure. Looking back, I'm rather ashamed at all of the modern conveniences that we find ourselves dependent upon, even if we're talking about hot water. For our part, we were fortunate that the gas grill was still operable, as the hood was just dented and cracked from the downed tree. We used it to cook all of our meals and to boil water on the side burner for baths. We used oil lanterns and candles for lighting at night. In the beginning, we iced most of our food down in a cooler, and also had some bags of ice thrown in the fridge and freezer for damage control. Later, after Dale's power came back on, we ran an extension cord from his house to the fridge. All in all, we lost about half of our food, so again it could have been a lot worse. Also, I had interent access through my cell phone. Our days and evenings with the kids were spent either cleaning the yard, or reading and playing board games. On that note, I will say that Rohan is the luckiest person I have ever played Monopoly against. For the record: It wasn't that much fun. I almost felt like B.B. Thorton playing the Kid in a game of checkers in Bad Santa. Also, the children lamented having to hand wash dishes, and course we felt no sympathy toward their plight. It was one of those character building moments that we parents are so fond of orchestrating. I'll admit that our patience was wearing thin by the time we finally had our power restored. We were one of the last in our neighborhood, because the rigid conduit had actually been ripped from the meter base. The power company had our line reconnected to the house the day after the storm, but it was several more days before the electrician could repair the damage on our end. Then we had to wait for the power company to come back and make the connection. I think it was the most annoying when we were still using oil lamps while the neighbors across the alley were throwing a party with loud music.
It's been a lot of work, but we were very blessed that our house was spared any major damage. I went down to New Orleans with a group from our church to help a family rebuild their home after Katrina, so I've witnessed catastrophic storm damage, and ours didn't even come close. Yet, there are some in southern Illinois that did lose their homes. My dad told me a story tonight of driving past the remains of a house trailer, seeing a guy sitting in a chair in what remained of his living room, surrounded by his possessions, just staring at the floor. So yeah, we were very blessed and fortunate. I took cold showers, ate a lot of hot dogs, burgers, and brats, suffered through pummelings from Rohan the Monopoly tycoon, got a wretched sore back from hauling tree refuse to the street, and got a ton of sleep. It wasn't much different than camping. Very, very, very fortunate indeed.
I was certain that that was it --a tornado was upon us. I sprinted up the stairs, grabbed some jeans and my boots, and bolted back to the basement. I dropped the clothes to the floor, picked up my kids, sat down with them on my lap, and started praying out loud. I'm not for sure how much time passed before I decided to go check things out...probably about fifteen or twenty minutes, at least. Once again, I sat the kids in their chairs and then went upstairs to observe what might be seen. It wasn't long before I discovered that Dale's tree had fallen parallel with our house, blocking our back door. I also found that that our tree to the east had fallen against our neighbor Steve's house. 
I then ran up to my room to get a bird's eye view of what had happened, and like every idiot out there, I grabbed my camera. I filmed a very short video clip in which you can tell that my emotions were somewhat frazzled. Viewing it now, it seems a little cheesy, but at the time I wasn't much worried about how I sounded. I still didn't know what had just hit us, but I knew that we were still still alive, praise God. After my quick filming, I ran back to the basement and brought the kids up to the living room as things outside seemed to be settling down.I guess pretty soon thereafter, since the windows were open I was aware that all of the neighbors had started to come out of their houses. I had been trying to call Emily and my parents, but the netword was dead. I went out front and got a good look at some of the damage down the street. There were trees down in almost every yard. 
Soon, Emily arrived with Allie and told me that I would have to walk to Washington School to get Rohan because there were trees and power lines down, preventing auto traffic from getting to the school. After I brought Rohan home I walked around outside for a bit taking pictures for insurance sake, not really knowing what would be needed. I found that that when Dale's tree came down, it blew through the vinyl fence, punched a hole in our roof above the sleeper porch, smashed some guttering, tore down our power service, smashed our vinyl patio fence, put some hurt on our gas grill, and busted through some lattice underneath our breakfast nook. Other than that, a window in Elena and Riddick's room broke, and some soffit and guttering came down. It all could have been much, much worse. After we got the kids settled down, I really wanted to get a way to the back door cleared, so with the cell network back up and running, I called my dad and asked him to bring over his chainsaw. While I waited for him to run the labyrinth of downed trees and closed streets, I was recruited to board up a second storey window of a neighbor who was out of town. After that job was finished, my dad had already gotten to our house, so I started in on the tree. Emily's dad showed up with a chainsaw as well and joined me in work. A little bit later, our neighbors, the Johnsons, came over and helped remove the refuse as we were cutting. Soon, we had the tree cut down to the main trunk which was across our sidewalk. What really saddens me is that it was a beautiful tulip tree, and we'll sorely miss it.
Soon, Emily arrived with Allie and told me that I would have to walk to Washington School to get Rohan because there were trees and power lines down, preventing auto traffic from getting to the school. After I brought Rohan home I walked around outside for a bit taking pictures for insurance sake, not really knowing what would be needed. I found that that when Dale's tree came down, it blew through the vinyl fence, punched a hole in our roof above the sleeper porch, smashed some guttering, tore down our power service, smashed our vinyl patio fence, put some hurt on our gas grill, and busted through some lattice underneath our breakfast nook. Other than that, a window in Elena and Riddick's room broke, and some soffit and guttering came down. It all could have been much, much worse. After we got the kids settled down, I really wanted to get a way to the back door cleared, so with the cell network back up and running, I called my dad and asked him to bring over his chainsaw. While I waited for him to run the labyrinth of downed trees and closed streets, I was recruited to board up a second storey window of a neighbor who was out of town. After that job was finished, my dad had already gotten to our house, so I started in on the tree. Emily's dad showed up with a chainsaw as well and joined me in work. A little bit later, our neighbors, the Johnsons, came over and helped remove the refuse as we were cutting. Soon, we had the tree cut down to the main trunk which was across our sidewalk. What really saddens me is that it was a beautiful tulip tree, and we'll sorely miss it.
After the storm we were without power for six evenings. It was a test of mild inovations, but a healthy exercise in modern day domestic survival to be sure. Looking back, I'm rather ashamed at all of the modern conveniences that we find ourselves dependent upon, even if we're talking about hot water. For our part, we were fortunate that the gas grill was still operable, as the hood was just dented and cracked from the downed tree. We used it to cook all of our meals and to boil water on the side burner for baths. We used oil lanterns and candles for lighting at night. In the beginning, we iced most of our food down in a cooler, and also had some bags of ice thrown in the fridge and freezer for damage control. Later, after Dale's power came back on, we ran an extension cord from his house to the fridge. All in all, we lost about half of our food, so again it could have been a lot worse. Also, I had interent access through my cell phone. Our days and evenings with the kids were spent either cleaning the yard, or reading and playing board games. On that note, I will say that Rohan is the luckiest person I have ever played Monopoly against. For the record: It wasn't that much fun. I almost felt like B.B. Thorton playing the Kid in a game of checkers in Bad Santa. Also, the children lamented having to hand wash dishes, and course we felt no sympathy toward their plight. It was one of those character building moments that we parents are so fond of orchestrating. I'll admit that our patience was wearing thin by the time we finally had our power restored. We were one of the last in our neighborhood, because the rigid conduit had actually been ripped from the meter base. The power company had our line reconnected to the house the day after the storm, but it was several more days before the electrician could repair the damage on our end. Then we had to wait for the power company to come back and make the connection. I think it was the most annoying when we were still using oil lamps while the neighbors across the alley were throwing a party with loud music.It's been a lot of work, but we were very blessed that our house was spared any major damage. I went down to New Orleans with a group from our church to help a family rebuild their home after Katrina, so I've witnessed catastrophic storm damage, and ours didn't even come close. Yet, there are some in southern Illinois that did lose their homes. My dad told me a story tonight of driving past the remains of a house trailer, seeing a guy sitting in a chair in what remained of his living room, surrounded by his possessions, just staring at the floor. So yeah, we were very blessed and fortunate. I took cold showers, ate a lot of hot dogs, burgers, and brats, suffered through pummelings from Rohan the Monopoly tycoon, got a wretched sore back from hauling tree refuse to the street, and got a ton of sleep. It wasn't much different than camping. Very, very, very fortunate indeed.
