I Didn't Know How Much Power Meant to Me

It's been a rough past few days. I don't know how many of you know, but I live in northern Alabama and last Wednesday, my town (and several others throughout Alabama) was hit really hard with several tornadoes and severe thunderstorms. I am very blessed as my family is safe and sound and our houses weren't damaged at all. However many families in our area and in our church family were not so fortunate. One family very close to my heart lost their home. We're are all so thankful that their whole family is alive and well though.

Here's my account if you really want to know. This is mainly for me. These past few days are days that I will remember forever.

The day of the storms I arrived at work like normal and for several weeks we've had terrible thunderstorms and threats of tornadoes, so when I heard the forecast I was not at all worried. Around lunch though the clouds outside my office window were black and and the clouds were coming from east and west. My office mate and I looked at each other and said, "That's not good...." It started raining hard shortly afterward and the schools announced they were letting out early for the day. My mom had gone out of town on business so I was supposed to keep McKenna (my little sister) that day. After the schools let out I went to go pick her up and the sky was still black with heavy rain pouring down.

I picked her up and we made it home with her friend in tow because she didn't want to stay at home by herself. We played games and hung out and then I made dinner. McKenna's friend was still there and her dad called to say that he was on the way and he had spotted several funnel clouds on the way over. This made me nervous. When he arrived, he came in to stay for a few minutes as the storm had worsened. Then the power went out. Fortunately I had just finished dinner so we were able to eat. That was the last good meal we had for days, haha. McKenna's friend and her dad left during a break in the storm and we sat down to play some cards in the dark. The sirens had been going off all day and they were still going off. It was raining sideways and trash cans were blowing down the street, but we were fine and nothing happened on our end. We listened to the radio and could hear about all of the damage going on around town. It was crazy hearing about all of those things going on so close to us while we were so unscathed ourselves.

I figured that the power was going to come on any minute, but it did not. After playing games for most of the night, we went to sleep. The next morning we still didn't have power and the DJs on the radio informed us that we would most likely be without power for 3 days, then they said 5-7 days. It was all so unclear. They were saying that most of the transmitters around our county had been destroyed in the storms. According to the DJs, a nearby town had full power so of course everyone would be going there for supplies and gas. I talked to a co-worker (which was a miracle as cell coverage was almost non-existant and my phone was almost dead anyway) who informed me that there was no power at work so I didn't need to come in. The schools were closed, work was closed, traffic lights were out and we only had 1 bag of charcoal. My co-worker told me that a Publix near my house was open so we decided to go there for food.

Publix was a madhouse. ALL the bread was gone and there was no charcoal. We were so happy to find some water and we bought a ton of junk food (I still used some coupons though! haha). We hoped that maybe the power would come on that day, but that was just wishful thinking. To make an already long story a little shorter, we were without power until this morning... But as much of an inconvenience as it was, I am just so happy that my family is safe and that we are safe. If anything would have happened to McKenna or my mom, it would have just destroyed me..... I know that I'm not a mother, but the attachment I have to and the love I feel for McKenna is so strong that I just cannot imagine anything bad happening to her. It would break my heart.

We are beyond blessed and we've had a lot of time to bond these past few days as we've been home (we stayed at my mother's place) sharing meals cooked on the grill and playing games by candlelight.

We're still praying for our neighbors affected by the storms and trying to figure our what we can do to help them rebuild their lives.