What
a way to begin the day. How? With an automated phone call at 3:57
a.m. The church fire alarm computer was calling
to let us know the system didn’t make its regular call to check in. Could the power possibly be out? Well … yeah.
Damage
reports from our house were coming in.
Branches from palm trees. The
slide in the back yard almost completely shifted from its normal position in
the yard. A house floating away from its
usual moorings. Appliances toppled. Do I have your attention yet? I’m angling for a writer’s job with the
weather channel. OK. Deep breath.
The branches were dead and needed to come down anyway. The slide is made of plastic. So is the little playhouse that floated a few
inches. Oh, and the kitchen appliances
were part of one of those plastic kids’ sets.
So here at 7005 we are doing OK so far.
Chris spoke a classic line at one point.
She was gazing out the front door at the sheets of rain pouring
down. She sighed and spoke, “I gotta go
water some plants.” Now I know she was
talking about the ones she has inside, but that one just struck me as funny.
My
cousin Jer in Florida called to check on us.
I got a text from his sister in Virginia as well. Great to hear family all over the country.
As the
day progressed and the rain bands subsided for a time we began hearing from
folks in the West End. For the most part
all was well, aside from power outages and some wind. So we decided to take a little drive and
survey the island. Actually we were just
getting a little stir crazy. Our first
thought was to drive by Nathan’s neighborhood.
The Lake that used to be Jones Park had other ideas. And all the streets from here to there were
under water, so we kept on moving west.
The church looked good from the outside.
Inside we were able to determine that some water had blown under one of the
doors just enough to get the mat wet. All
else was good, though. We continued on
down 3005 toward Sea Isle. That’s where
we saw Fire Engine 8 and its crew. They
told me about an electrical pole up the road a bit that was leaning way
over. They also asked if I had noticed that
there was no longer a blinking light at the entrance to Sea Isle. I had to admit that I missed that one. We drove down to the electrical pole, then
turned back and drove down the seawall for a while. The lull in rain bands had reached an hour or
two by then, and there were people out walking on the beach. We returned home down the One Way until about
Ball High, then cut back up to the Seawall.
Good thing. Lots of flooded
streets down in those neighborhoods.
After
a lull of several hours, the rains began again around ten or so … and
beyond. Well beyond. So beyond that they are still going. Very noisy, too. I got a text around 1:30 a.m. from one of our
Seasiders, Sam, who had evacuated to her house in League City. Mistake, as it turned out. The house had begun taking on water. She couldn’t find the breaker box to turn off
the electricity. It was a scary few
hours for her. Since I was fully awake, I
turned the TV back on to hear what they were saying about the latest
rounds. It didn’t sound good. My post for prayer for Sam was met with other
posts about people taking on water. It was
also met with assurances from people all over that they were awake and praying
right then. Chris texted Christina and
found out they had all their kids in the big master bedroom closet of their house
in LaMarque. They were finding it hard
to settle in because of the every-half-hour tornado alerts being sounded. I went outside around 2 a.m. to see if our
sycamore tree was still standing, and what should I see lying there in the yard? Our Sunday newspaper. Nice job, newspaper delivery guy.
Sometime
around midnight the fire department got a call for a house on fire in Terramar
Beach, not far from the church. The
Jamaica Beach volunteer department responded to that one as well. The house was as loss, but they got the fire
under control and out quickly. One of
the fire fighters had to have an IV to get fluids replenished, but other than
that, they were all well. Pretty
impressive bunch.
Let
me end this segment with some of actual quotations from the TV coverage early
this morning (Like, 2 a.m. early). It was a long day, I’ll give them that …
“You
cannot be on the road out there, because it is nighttime.” Brilliant.
“If
you’re gonna be stuck someplace, it may as well be at Buccees.” Now that
makes a lot of sense.
And my
personal favorite …
“The
best thing we can do is keep our heads above water.” Umm. OK.
1
Peter 5:7 says, “Cast all your anxiety on
him because he cares for you.”
Father,
keep watching over us. We are gonna need
your protection for … for a while. Amen.
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