We've had a few days of extreme upheaval around here, and I mean that literally.
Monday night, the weather warnings were severe and the worst of it was bearing right down on my locality. Mr. Kathie, Lucy, and I thought it prudent to head for the basement. We followed all the proceedings on TV, sweating bullets about the brand new roof that had been on the house only since last week.
Once the storm sounded like it had abated somewhat, we ventured back upstairs to see what had happened.
The porch light was conveniently out of commission, but in the somewhat irregular glow of the lightning, it looked like one of our beautiful ancient oaks was gone. Could that possibly be true? Mr. Kathie didn't think so. I was sure I was seeing a very large stump where a tree should have been. He ventured down the driveway in a car, came back, and announced that not only was a big oak gone, at least four or five other trees on our property were down too.
And our mailbox was gone.
So bizarre.In the morning light, the sight was just amazing--trees down everywhere, parts of garage doors in the street, insulation spread through everyone's yards. Most of the parts of houses had blown in from some fair distance away. How surreal to have our beautiful and lush June marred by such a thing.
But my neighborhood was fortunate--this was only a glancing blow of an F2 tornado. Very few houses had actual structural damage. The next town over, where I work, was hit hard by the tornado. At least 25 families lost their homes. Amazingly enough, no one was killed or seriously injured. The response from emergency crews has been outstanding and other volunteers have done a fabulous job. My library is in the municipal building and still has no power. I haven't worked since Monday, and may be off the rest of this week.
Our house is unscathed, including the brand new roof. We are so very fortunate. One of my co-workers will be out of her home for a month while structural repairs are completed.
It's apparent that the big oak had been pretty fragile.
It had been struck by lightning many years ago and had dead areas in its upper reaches, but it leafed out nicely every year, and we'd hoped against hope that it would go on forever.. It was pretty heartbreaking to see such a venerable tree bite the dust.
11 comments:
amazing what mother nature can do in a few minutes.
glad no one was hurt . Sorry about your trees. Can you use the branches as firewood?
enjoy your few days off!
Kathie
I'm glad you were ok but it is such a shame to see trees come down, what a scary time.
aye yay yay. so glad you were safe. and lucky none of those gorgeous trees hit your house.
You must be very near Eagle WI. My daughter and family live over in De Forest by Madison and they were in tornado warning also and took cover in the basement - lucky for them the storm passed them with no damage - sorry to hear it got you but glad to hear the trees took the damage and your house did not.
Karen
http://karensquilting.com/blog/
Wow -- tooooo much bad weather happening. Thank goodness you had the sense to get to the basement instead of 'watching out the window' as a lot of us do! Yes it was time for that old tree to go - not much left of the poor thing.
A lot of OUR yucky weather ended up in YOUR back yard. Stay safe.
Kathie - I have been gone for the last 10 days, although my husband informed me of the tornado damage. I fretted that your area was hit. So sad to lose your oaks, etc. but am relieved that your lovely home is unscathed.
sue
Wow, that must have been frightening, as well as disheartening. Happy to hear the damage was *only* to trees and not home or health.
Wow! I'm glad you are okay.
oh my! How scary! Glad your ok.
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