WARNING: THIS MIGHT BE LONG!!!
We ended Tuesday, the 9th, like any other day. Everyone was watching the progress of IKE, but no one was really worried. Ike was heading toward Corpus Christi which is quite a ways a way from us. At 3:55 am Wednesday morning, I received a phone call from a co-worker, J, who informed me of the mandatory evacuation of the city where my school is. A voluntary evacuation of my city was also issued. Talk about a wake-up call! (I actually thought it was B who was calling saying I was late for cheerleader practice which starts at 6:15.) At that point I tried to get ahold of B to figure out when a good time to call the cheerleaders would be. How do you justify calling at 4:15??? We decided that 5:00 would be acceptable. After talking to a bunch of moms--who all thanked me profusely!--and not reaching 3 girls, I drove to the school. It was very eerie. Most mornings when I head to practice there are only 5 or 6 cars on the road. There were 3 times as many just at one gas station! I went into the school after talking to all but one cheerleader and "rescued" some of my favorite items--all my yearbooks and my picture from my two weeks at NASA in 2001. I also moved a bunch of items from the floor just in case. After waiting in line for about 10 minutes to get gas (I got to cut in line because my gas tank is on the passenger side), I made a bunch of phone calls to "locals" who have done this more than I have. (I've only evacuated one other time and a good friend C MADE me go with her. I had no choice!) I decided to go stay with a friend in Austin (THANKS BUNCHES T!!!!). Because T wouldn't get home until after 8 pm, I waited until about 4:30/5:00 to leave. It is so nerve racking sitting around on a beautiful, sunny day (with no clouds in the sky) waiting to leave because you know something so powerful might come and wipe out everything you own. I kept watch of Ike on many different websites and checked out other blogs to keep my sanity. I taped up all of my windows--can't really board them up--said a prayer and walked out the door not knowing what I would come home to. As I made the 4-5 hour drive, I called several people to find out their plans. Most of them wouldn't be leaving until sometime on Thursday.
The next few days were spent with trips to grocery stores and watching the weather on tv. When Ike made landfall and wound his way up through Houston, I worried about several friends who were staying directly in the path. Thankfully, they are a-ok. The hardest part was not knowing what was happening back home and hearing rumors from different people. We spent part of Saturday at an outlet mall, and I ran into a former student and family. They heard the roof of our school caved in completely. Not true. We also heard there was a chlorine leak. Don't know if that was true or not. Electricity was on in the city where my school is, but not where I live. The decision was made to come home on Monday, the 15th.
Driving home, we stopped and bought groceries--not knowing if I had electricity, I stocked up on Honey-nut Cheerios, Goldfish crackers and Capri Sun. Healthy I know. (J--don't yell at me! At least I didn't have too much food to throw away.) Driving in was really creepy. The closer we got, the more trees we saw down. The interesting part of the trip was that the trees missed everything. The potential for trees to hit houses was about 100%, but the actual amount was maybe 1%--unless I just didn't see it. When I arrived home, my electricity was on, my water was working and my house was almost perfect. There were a lot of trees down and one screen fell off of one window. I put that back on and was good to go. I was very relieved.
I have been without cable since I've been home. I am trying not to complain since so many people have lost everything. However, it's really hard to not watch tv. We are so spoiled in this country. Everytime I get frustrated, I remind myself what I have. One of the communities that send their children to our school was hit very hard--it's right on the water and over 60 houses were lost. I haven't heard if any of our kiddos lost their home or not. I will probably find out more once we go back to school.
While all of this was going on, some dear family and friends were having bad weather in IL...lots of rain and flooding. Then, Ike headed their way. I have a lot of dear family/friends across the nation, and Ike seemed to touch almost all of them directly...and the ones he didn't hit directly are feeling it indirectly with gas prices. What crazy weather we have.
Happy Day!
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