In case you missed it before, I can be very fretful. Embarrassingly so. And about everything. I hate it, I try to fight it, but I still worry too much. My mind always runs to the worst-case scenario in any situation. And my brain is pretty creative.
Anyway!
After a very long day yesterday (including a nap after which I felt even more tired than before) I was ready to settle down when the family gathered in our room to watch a movie. (Dolphin Tale, which I'd never intended to watch but actually enjoyed.)
We'd had bad weather all day and had kept on the watch for tornado alerts, but nothing had come of it thus far. Lots of thunder and rain and very heavy, dark clouds, as well as wind.
Half-way through the movie, I asked Mom if she'd heard the noise I'd heard. My ears were tuned for the sound. Mom said it was only the movie, but at my insistence, she paused the movie. Immediately the sound was clear: tornado sirens.
My stomach lurched and dropped like a roller coaster. Snap. I grabbed my pillow, blanket, and Bible and hurried downstairs. Mom was fiddling with the radio and Aunt Trudy was checking the computer. We'd been in the watch box all day, but now we were in the warning. They were mentioning locations just miles away. The wind was dead, the lightning was constant, and there wasn't rain, which scares me more than hail and driving winds.
I won't even pretend I tried to be brave. I didn't. I just gave way to the fear. I don't see the point in fighting it, because it only confuses my stomach more. Any more knots and it would take all the next day to sort them out so I could eat.
Eventually Allenna and I retreated to the basement, where I sat down on a box and hugged my pillow. Mom and Aunt Trudy stopped by to try to ease our minds as the sirens went back and forth between on and off. Aunt Trudy started rummaging around for supplies. We had a jug of water, a box marked "candles" that didn't seem to have candles, a lighter, and lots of reading material. Grand.
Meanwhile, we could hear the wind chimes from the house across the street and the sound of cars speeding by. We could hear the floors creaking and the faint sound of the TV.
Finally the alert was over. I crept back upstairs, stopped shaking, and breathed. We went back upstairs to finish the movie, and then turned on the air conditioner and crawled into bed. I kept hearing phantom sirens in the whine of the AC and the noises of the storm outside (it had started raining hard). But I did manage to fall asleep eventually.
Today is a windy but cloudless day (well, cloudless now), as if nothing had ever happened, which is how it usually goes. Aunt Trudy and I agreed that an upside to traveling during bad weather means we don't have much stuff to worry about, which helps matters, if only a little.
See, now my brain is working a little better. Yay!
