The Fear of Wind

The finger of God.

I attended Sunday school as a child and had never heard that phrase before. I have prayed to God and worshiped his name many times but had never before heard that phrase.

The finger of God.

I’m a mother now, married to a wonderful man who gave me a beautiful son. I know how it feels to find my soul mate, and I have experienced the miracle of birth. But never in my life had I known that phrase before.

The finger of God.

I never knew of it until it came to my home. It destroyed my house, harmed my family, and instilled fear in my soul.

I experienced this destruction from under my overturned couch. I was clutching my 20-month-old son to my chest and praying. My husband and my brother were on top of the couch, holding on for their lives. I painstakingly endured the 30 seconds it took to destroy the house we spent so much time rebuilding and creating memories in. I watched as my basement walls were sucked into the sky. My husband saw the front of our home lift off its foundation and fly into the night. I felt my neighbor’s boat trailer land next to me in what was once our family room.

On that Saturday night, I learned what that phrase meant. I had survived destruction that could only be likened to the finger of God: I had just survived a tornado.

As a new mom, I was looking forward to my second Mother’s Day with my son, Jayden. It was the evening before my special day, and I was giving my son a bath. My husband, Jason, and my brother, Scott, were watching television in the living room. I had just dried Jayden off and fastened his diaper when the tornado sirens began wailing.

I wasn’t too frightened: I grew up in the Midwest and was used to the shrill cry of the storm horns. As I carried Jayden down the basement steps, I yelled over my shoulder at the guys to come to the basement. They refused, saying they were going outside to see what was going on.

I called my dad to make sure he was safely in his basement. He said he had taken shelter and was glad we were in the basement. My heart smiled as I watched Jayden run around in his diaper, eating french fries and giggling with innocence. As I scooped him into my arms and hugged him tight, I heard a commotion upstairs. Jason and Scott screamed, “Its coming! It’s coming!” Their footsteps thundered over our heads as they ran into the house to take cover. I screamed to my dad that the tornado was here. He asked if we were all in the basement. I reassured him we were fine as my maternal instinct made me flip the couch over my baby and myself. As the guys started down the stairs, I heard it.

It wasn’t like anything else I have ever heard before. Some people say it sounds like a freight train: But those same people usually hear it from a distance. When a tornado is on top of you, it roars like the loudest jet engine you’ve ever heard in your life. It’s like 100 jet engines revving up for takeoff.

Our screaming was the last thing my father heard before the lines went dead.

The first thing I felt was the pressure: My head felt as if it was going to explode. My ears popped and the air around me felt dead. Jayden’s cries echoed in my head. I thought, my God, I haven’t had my baby long enough—it can’t be our time now. As the pressure increased, I saw Jason and Scott dive down the stairs, leaping for safety.

As the roar grew louder, I began to hear creaking. I could hear the nails being ripped from our house. The wood frame was moaning against the pressure, creaking as it gave in to the storm. And then it began—our house began dissolving piece by piece. I could hear wood snapping, like little 2x4 pieces. I knew our couch would be taken next. I could hear Jason and Scott screaming in pain as the debris began beating them. They could hold the couch down, but who would hold them down?

My prayers continued as did the snapping and cracking. Then it happened: my house disintegrated. The intense pressure of the tornado created a vacuum inside the house, literally imploding it.

Slowly, the wind began to quiet. I began to hear yelling and the familiar voices of our neighbors. I heard my name being called, and I knew I was still alive. It was so dark. I tried to lift the couch off of us but it wouldn’t budge. I felt something sticky on me and realized it was mud, carried in by the rain and rising from beneath us. I thought, I just survived a tornado and now I’m going to be buried alive? I screamed for my husband, knowing I may not hear a response. But I did. It was the most beautiful sound: It warmed my heart.

Although I could not see the chaos outside of the two feet wide, two feet high space I was sharing with my sobbing baby, I knew it must be bad. Someone found my cell phone in the rubble and passed it to me through a hole. I was told to keep pushing the buttons, as the blue light radiating from the keypad gave my rescuers a direction to dig. I kept pressing the buttons, over and over, concentrating on the phone’s illuminated face.

After what seemed an eternity of yelling and digging, I heard our rescuers say that they almost had us out. As my heart leapt for joy, a familiar sound ripped it from my chest.

The tornado siren was sounding again.

As people worked to cut through the bottom of my couch, the siren echoed through my head. As the mud rose with every inch of falling rain, a familiar hand reached into the hole above my head. I had slipped a ring onto that hand just four years ago, promising love until death: It was my husband’s.

I grabbed it and screamed that we were alive in here.

He yelled for me to crawl through the hole but it was too small. But I knew Jayden could fit. I kissed his soft hair, squeezed him to my chest for what I hoped wasn’t our last hug and passed him to the hands reaching for him.

As the voices above worked to enlarge the hole, the sirens kept blaring, the rain kept falling, and the mud kept rising. I had never suffered from claustrophobia before but I was now living the fear of being trapped. I was glad I kissed my son goodbye before I handed him away.

After approximately 30 minutes, the voices grew more excited: The hole was growing. Now I truly wished I had lost those extra pounds I had kept after my pregnancy! As the voices told me to squeeze through the hole, I pushed with all my strength.

And then I was free. I was still in my basement but I was looking up into the sky. My house was gone. The basement walls Jason built when he remodeled our lower level into a cozy family room had been sucked away. Everything was gone. There was nothing left except rubble. I thought of all the treasures I had in my home. My teddy bear collection was gone, along with my clothes and furniture. My wedding pictures were gone. Jayden’s baby book was gone. Everything…gone.

The sirens howled as I searched the faces surrounding me in the dark. I didn’t know who anyone was. I saw Jason digging my brother Scott out from under some wood.

My baby. Where was my baby? I screamed for Jayden and was told he was taking cover in the house across the street.

I sprinted across the seemingly endless stretch of road between my house and my neighbor’s. I flung the door open, and I saw my baby. He was covered in mud and still clad only in his diaper. His lower lip trembled as he reached out to me. I held him to my chest and smelled him to make sure I wasn’t dreaming. The scent of baby lotion told me I had my baby back.

I heard my name and saw Jason. I turned into his embrace and cried as our family hugged. He told me he was okay but Scott had hurt his hand. His right thumb was attached by a mere tendon and a single flap of skin.

We were then ushered down the street to the grade school. I saw my neighbors, my friends—people I had seen in my neighborhood but never stopped to talk with. We hugged and cried and mourned the loss of our town.

I told Jason I knew my father would be looking for us. He kissed me deeply and ran out the door to find my dad. As the sirens blared, we were instructed to take cover in the school’s hallway. I tucked Jayden under me, covered my head with my hand and prayed.

The storm eventually subsided. My dad, shaking from sheer panic and fear, found me in the school. A fireman found Jason wondering the streets, still looking for my dad, and brought him back.

We stayed in the makeshift shelter until daybreak. Although we were muddy and tired, we had to see what was left of our home.

The street signs were gone. It’s strange; you travel down the same street for years, knowing exactly where you live without glancing at a street sign. Now that they and other familiar landmarks were missing, it was difficult to gain our bearings.

We approached what was left of our street. The trees were bare, stripped of their foliage and limbs. There weren’t many houses, only concrete foundations piled with wood. I instantly recognized our basement. Jayden’s blue racecar bed was overturned next to our house. Our toilet was in our sink, on our mattress, in our front yard. Our car windows were blown out. Suddenly, my car alarm sounded. Jason and I exchanged surprised glances, wondering why it hadn’t gone off sooner. We heard a male voice yelling that he found our car keys. It was a police officer. He was walking through a nearby field and had found a set of keys with an automatic key tag. He pressed the panic button and waited to find the owner.

That was the first time we laughed. The absurdity of the situation finally hit us, and we laughed. We had to or we weren’t going to survive this disaster.

The days ran together as we sifted through what was left of our belongings. The American Red Cross and many other volunteers came by every day with food and water. God bless those people.

We didn’t find much more of our possessions: A table here, a lamp there. We searched for our five pets, reuniting with all but one: My husband found our cat, Squeaker, under the debris from our bedroom. He used to hide under our bed when he was afraid. We’re guessing he died there.

Jason and Scott were pelted by the debris with such force they were picking glass shards and dirt from their backs and scalps for weeks.

I asked Jason what it was like to actually be in the tornado. He said it was just like the movies: The wind was so fierce the debris embedded in every part of his body. But the center, the eye, of the storm was calm. He looked up and saw stars in the clear sky. He said it was surreal.

It’s been two months since the tornado ripped our lives apart. Our house is almost rebuilt, bigger and better with more closet space. The insurance company gave us quite a time with proving our house “demolished.” They wanted pictures of our old hardwood floors to prove we actually had them. We told them the pictures were probably with the floor.

But we know how lucky we are: Many of our neighbors were renters and didn’t have insurance.

Our physical wounds are healing: Scott’s thumb was successfully reattached and looks healthy. He and Jason still find gravel and other debris stuck in their scalps from time to time. Our cuts and bruises are long gone. It’s the emotional wounds that are leaving the deepest scars.

When thunder claps, Jayden screams until his lips are purple. I panic at a mere cloud in the sky, frightened it may spawn a tornado. We’ve been staying in Jason’s dad’s basement until our house is done. His father has a huge house built of brick. I lie in bed at night and imagine how heavy the rubble would be if the house was blown in on us.

As we start to rebuild our lives, small miracles have occurred: Most importantly, not one single person died in our tornado. Someone found Jayden’s first Christmas stocking in a field thirty minutes from our house. My cousin received a call from a coworker who found a muddy envelope containing a lock of blond hair. She heard about the storm and wondered if it was debris. It was a curl from Jayden’s first haircut.

As the spring rolls in again, I fear the storms. I fear that the devastation that rained upon my family will visit again. I have become a weather expert and take extreme precautions to protect us.

And I pray the finger of God will never touch my home again.