THE CALM… AFTER THE STORM
My son and I were on our way home last Wednesday from getting floaties (ironic- no?) when the skies started looking dark. In a matter of 5 minutes it was raining… then thundering, then pouring, then raining so hard I could barely see.
I was immediately annoyed because the rain wasn’t supposed to hit yet, and I was driving in it. But in the next moment, as the storm continued to get worse and the street started to flood, I went from annoyed to ‘I have the most precious cargo of my life in his car seat in back’.
Water was everywhere, with nowhere to go. The street kept filling up, and I grasped the steering wheel.
“You can do it, mommy… You can do it!” My 4-year-old said.
The storm was so loud beating down on the car, ‘No problem!’ I yelled back to him.
I tried to hide my fear and I got us home safe. We were inside and I tried to now hide my shaking…
I smiled at my son and said, ‘Well, that was an adventure’. And just like I thought, he picked up on my vibe and laughed.
Trees were down everywhere. Within just a mile radius of our home I saw three enormous trees down, closing streets.
Wires were tangling dangerously in the neighborhood. A telephone pole was precariously tipping over, being pulled by a downed tree. Branches were everywhere. We learned on the car radio that some small tornadoes went through other areas close-by. All of the fury of that storm… but remarkably, I saw no houses and more importantly, people that were damaged- just power lines and trees.
I turned on the lights- they came on! I turned on the TV for the news of the storm- it worked too!
I picked up the phone- dead.
The computer- dead. We have Verizon Fios, and found out later that our Verizon box had been fried by a power surge or something.
So on Thursday came the calm. We had no phone calls, no internet, and we had to stay close to home all-day-long for a Verizon Representative to come and fix our service.
We made cookies. We colored. We even talked about the storm.
When my husband got home he asked me if I was in ‘email withdrawal’ yet.
I stopped and looked at him, “No… isn’t that funny?”
Everything was restored by late Thursday night.
Friday morning I woke up to the sound of my son’s door opening and little feet pounding into our bedroom. He jumped up on the bed, crawled over to me and with no prompting, announced, “Happy Birthday Mommy!”
There’s no better way to start a birthday… or any day, for that matter. There is a lot to be thankful for.
An abbreviated version of this can be found at DC Metro Moms.
Comments
One Comment on THE CALM… AFTER THE STORM
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Leticia- Tech Savvy Mama on
Sun, 8th Jun 2008 7:09 pm
Happy birthday! I’m so glad you made it home safely and didn’t lose power like we did!
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