Can't Move On

Whenever a natural disaster or tragedy strikes, I think I become slightly obsessed with it. I am glued to the news and read every story I can...every story of heartbreak and tragedy...every story of survival and miracles. I just can't let it go, and I think it drives Dale nuts to hear me talk about it so incessantly. It was like this after Haiti, after Newtown, etc.

I think, for me, I feel like it's my duty to learn about what happened; to not let what happened be forgotten; to learn how to help and how to be prepared should the unspeakable happen to us. For me to forget or walk away would feel like betraying or negating the pain and suffering that is happening.
It's been like this since Sunday.

Every spring, my stress level rises dramatically as storms come in and meteorologists start warning, and later start yelling to get to storm shelters. People have accused me of being paranoid, but after living in Norman for 3 years and having 2 tornadoes come within miles of our homes, I told Dale that there was NO WAY I would stay in Oklahoma unless we had a tornado shelter.

I will proclaim to anyone who will listen the importance of getting a tornado shelter. It is worth every penny! Yesterday, I knew that even with storms potentially heading our way, our family would be safe. I was able to take others in from church and let them wait out the storm, just in case. Our neighbors know they are free to come hang out in our shelter with us.

I can't tune out the tragedy...it is everywhere in the news and written on my heart. As Cameron tenderly held a butterfly that had taken refuge from our latest thunderstorm in our garage, I burst into tears, being reminded of how fragile life really is. I feel so helpless, living so close, and yet so far from the tragedy in Moore.

I never thought I could care so deeply for Oklahoma, but it's become part of us. Dale mocks the slight accent I have started to pick up, and I gasped in shock when Kimball first said he was "fixin' to..." for the first time the other day. Like it or not, for this season of our lives, we belong to this land and our hearts are hurting.

Tornado Shelter

I made Dale swear that if we stay in OK, we would have a tornado shelter. In the 3 years we lived in Norman, there were 2 tornadoes within a mile of our apartment so I decided the stress was too much to deal with if we didn't have a shelter. We finally got our shelter and Cameron was in little boy heaven! How often do you have a front-end loader, semi-truck and mini excavator in your backyard?! Kimball just about jumped out the bus window when he got home.

The boys would not leave the deck the whole time they were here.

Sweeping off the shelter after it was installed

The semi truck that had the shelter on it also had a crane to lift the shelter into the hole. As it was lowering the shelter, the entire truck tipped over and the braces broke our sewer line. They had to reposition the truck several times to be able to lower the shelter in.

After all the heavy equipment left, our poor lawn was non-existent. The dirt is super compacted and will probably be a muddy bog for who-know-how-long, but we have somewhere safe to go.

The boys love playing down there and are comfortable in there and we have emergency supplies.