Yes, this is a week late and now it’s December which apparently means Christmas-all-the-time. But I still wanted to write a Thanksgiving post, because this year I have a lot of reasons to be especially thankful.
On May 22, my hometown of Joplin, Missouri was hit by an F-5 tornado. I had been home for a week, but left that morning to drive back to Chicago. My mom heard the sirens and started to drive to St. John’s hospital to take shelter in the basement, but turned around halfway there and headed back home. She just barely made it into the house in time.
She lives on the very edge of town, and her street was the first residential area to be impacted. We lost the back fence, patio furniture and grill, and a lot of shingles. All of the windows on the east side of the house blew in, along with the glass French doors that open onto the patio. Her house was unlivable for months. But just a few houses down, the damage was so extensive that our neighbors had no choice but to tear their homes down to the foundation and build again. One block further east, homes were destroyed entirely. Below is a photo of our little section of the neighborhood,with my mom’s house circled in red. The first destroyed house is in the lower left corner, and if you follow the path east you can see the damage worsen very quickly. I suggest you click to see an enlarged version, this doesn’t really do it justice.
So, so close. The hospital where my mom was originally going to take shelter was hit directly. Given the storm’s path, it’s unlikely she would have survived if she had continued driving there. Or if she had driven home a little bit slower.
The tornado stayed on the ground for 32 minutes. Its total track length was 22 miles, and at its worst it was a mile wide. It killed 161 people. The photo below gives some indication of its impact: you can see the trail moving from west to east and leaving behind what looks like a greyish-brown smudge. Like the tornado was a huge eraser.
Here is a closer look at the heart of the tornado zone. Again, please click to enlarge.
It sounds trite, but most people live every day taking so many things for granted. I know I did. I took for granted the safety of my family, and the security of our home. I took for granted the fact that we even had a home, with all of our possessions stored safely inside. And then the tornado came, and it turned everything upside down.
I’m going to try very hard, from now on, to be thankful for all of these things that I used to take for granted. Despite the horrible, life-changing relationship things that happened to me this year (to wit: an awesome combination of depression, alcoholism, extended infidelity, financial fraud/theft, and months of lies and emotional abuse resulting in the end of a ten-year relationship and now-pending litigation), I am blessed. So, so blessed.
I am blessed to have my family and my home and my friends. And I am especially blessed to have my job, which gives me the opportunity to spend all day every day serving those whose lives on May 23 looked a lot worse than they did on May 21. My mom is back in her house, and things are mostly back to normal around here (or at least the “new normal”). I want that for everyone here in Joplin. Because we survived, and we’re rebuilding, and we’re going to be back stronger and better than ever. We are all so blessed.
