My first memory of a tornado was somewhere around seven or eight years old. I was at Grandma Margie’s house playing. Throughout my childhood, I spent as much time at my grandmother’s house as my parents would allow. She was my favorite person.
I remember it was bright in the house and then it wasn’t, but it was still afternoon. Grandma and I went out onto the wrap-around deck and stared at a pea-green sky. I remember thinking the sky looked sick.
We stood on the porch together while my grandma explained tornadoes to me. She told me they were dangerous. She explained where I should hide if I was scared. But she told me that I was perfectly safe because her home, and my childhood home, were both contained inside of valleys. She explained that tornadoes rarely had the power to travel down into the valleys and still cause destruction. Instead, she said if a tornado came down the valley, it would lose steam and fizzle out. Instead, any storm she’d ever seen in the area went around the valley, as though it could sense its own destruction waiting at the bottom.
We stood on the porch for a while, watching the storm clouds roll and move towards us. It started to get very windy, and then it started raining, the sky moving from an ugly green to an inky grey. We went inside, but my grandma stayed at the door, watching the storm through the screen.
I became frightened by the lightning, so I ran to the hallway and hid behind the quilt rack, pulling my favorite blanket down and wrapping it around myself. I remember putting my hands over my ears and crying.
When the world became quiet again, I climbed out and joined my grandma, who was still watching the storm from the screen door. She wrapped her arm around me and held me in place, telling me that I was as safe as could be.
We watched the storm pass until the sky brightened again. Afterwards, I sat at the kitchen island and colored, my view of the outside storm unobstructed through the screen door. The phone rang many times, and my grandma was busy. Someone’s fence had been destroyed, and the cows had gotten out. Grandma called one of my uncles to rush over and help. Neighbors called to check in, to chat about damage, to orchestrate supply donations for affected neighbors.
We lived in the country, and everyone banded together. I remember listening to her talk to everyone we knew, and I was aware, even at such a young age, that my grandmother was the hub of our area of the country. When something happened, she knew about it. If an event was being thrown, she was invited. If a disaster struck, she put together resources.
My grandmother passed in 2004, but my obsession with tornadoes, born that afternoon on the porch watching the sky grow angrier and angrier, is stronger than ever.
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