Weathering the Storm – and Blessings in moving on too fast

Yikes! That was more excitement than I needed in one night! (And to explain our mental capacity or lack of: we had been up the night before with B whose final bout of sickness ended at 3:30am.) At 7pm Huck told me that there was a tornado warning. I looked it up and thought that’s fine, hopefully, surely we will have nothing to worry about. We’re right on the water -do tornadoes occur right on the water? We looked at the radar a couple times and it seemed like the worst and biggest part of the storm was past and the remaining bits would head north, so the storm would remain west of us. I had finally decided we were in the clear and we could rest easily. My head hit the pillow and minutes later our phones started going off and it was now “Extreme Alert – Tornado Warning in effect for the next 30 minutes or so.” Ok.

Hmmm. What do we do? We’re from a part of Colorado that rarely gets a tornado and even more rarely a tornado to be concerned about. (The exception happened last summer when both my son and husband and brother-in-law wound up in the path in 3 different vehicles and 2 different locations!)

In a house I’m less concerned – go to the basement. But here we were in a tin box with no where to go. I tried to call the park manager. He wasn’t too concerned. Hadn’t heard/gotten the alerts (by now we’d had 2!) so I didn’t trust him. I called the “Emergency After Hours Park Ranger.” No answer. Hm. Would they sound an alarm like they do back home? (btw the next day I found out the ranger was already asleep – longer story there.) Anyway, I finally convinced Huck that yes, it was a good idea for us to wake the kids and head to the bath house which is at least more solid. And by the way, let’s go now while the rain has subsided! I got out the ponchos and we woke the kids, trying to be as casual as possible. We were too casual as I was the only one jogging to the bathrooms!

It made me feel less paranoid to see quite a few other campers in the women’s side of the bath house. Oh my family decided NOT to follow me and went to the men’s side. Ugh. I went out in the rain again to the other side. (also, though I don’t wish it on other campers, it was reassuring to hear from some other full-time families that they have spent time in bathrooms during tornado alerts – thank you friends for reassuring me!)

In the end there was no tornado in our area and about 45 minutes later the radar looked clear enough to say that the storm had passed. Back to our camper where we found 2 spots of pretty good water….hmmm. Luckily my smart husband figured both out and they were relatively easy fixes.

The next morning we found out that there had been significant loss at an RV resort in Louisiana and also damage in Mobile, AL.  Interestingly, I had just been wondering if we had moved on too fast in our travels. There was still more to see and do in New Orleans, Mobile and Birmingham. We only spent hours in Birmingham and there was sooo much more I wanted to see and explore there….and by the way can anyone say Birmingham without singing “in Birmingham they love the Gov’nor oooo, ooo, oooo?!?” More on that in another post.

The good news, as I have trusted and believed, God led us where we needed to be, in the right timing. Too many “could haves” exist if we had stayed in any of those 3 places. And in the end, we are safe and I now have a better idea of what I will do and when I will do it in the case of future storms, which are certain to arise. Oh and I can’t wait to get back to Longmont where we rarely have to worry about natural disasters and I have a cozy basement room to hunker down in!

3 thoughts on “Weathering the Storm – and Blessings in moving on too fast

  • February 27, 2016 at 3:18 am
    Permalink

    So glad to hear that all is well and no tornado circled your rig. Know that you are in our prayers…. That God will provide for and protect each of you.

    Reply
    • February 27, 2016 at 3:25 am
      Permalink

      Thank you so much! We appreciate and welcome the prayers! I do believe He is leading us each day to wonderful people, places, and experiences! Honestly I haven’t done too much planning. The things that pop up and kind of appear in our path have been some of the best! (Aside from our visit with our friends and our niece!!)

      Reply
      • February 27, 2016 at 1:47 pm
        Permalink

        I know what you mean…but I just want to clarify for our readers…our visit with friends and our niece were some of the best….its just that those had been planned for awhile. 🙂

        Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *