Tornado

It was a normal day at the lake, one we often shared as a young family on our speedboat.  Darting around the lake with the speed assisted wind sweeping our hair in all directions and floating around in our life jackets wading in the cool water happily filled a typical day.

It wasn’t a sunny day in late August, but it was a white warm sky with dense air creating a glass stillness on the water, perfect to watch my mom and dad take turns water skiing. We always laughed and applauded as my dad would glide to each side of the boat, pretending to race the boat to get ahead first.

Later in the day the wind started to pick up and the sky looked a blank canvas of white.  My parents thought it may be an oncoming storm, so we decided to go into the marina.  Wind began to increase quickly causing whitecaps to form on the formerly glistening water.  As kids, we were oblivious, but my parents began to worry if we would make it.  My dad pushed the throttle down to full.  We giggled as we bounced up and down when the boat hit the ever-rising waves.

Minutes seemed like hours for my parents as they looked up to the graying sky, never letting on the fear they felt at upcoming danger. The ship to shore radio warned boaters to get into the docks as a funnel cloud was spotted a few miles away.

We quickly tied up the boat and hurried onto the dock.  My parents put my baby sister in her stroller buggy, which transformed into a make shift crib under the bow of the boat. With precision pace, we moved along the dock to the metal swing bridge that led to the parking lot. The wind raced blowing debris in every direction, howling with a shallow empty whistle.  As we reached the bridge, the air was swirling with immense power, pushing back two steps with every step taken forward. My dad hung onto my brother and I sheparding us across the bridge.  Suddenly a gust grabbed the baby stroller and began lifting it into the air.  My mother laid on top of the buggy, pushing blindly along with her feet trying to get to the car. The bridge was swinging back and forth in time with the wind causing the buggy to yield to its dance.  My dad grabbed onto the stroller to steady it, but he couldn’t hold the buggy and my brother and I.  My mom lifted upward to take my sister out of the buggy, but it began to lift again into the air.  She had to use her bodyweight to steady it, but we were only a little bit more than halfway across the bridge.

A young couple came up from behind and took my brother and I by the hand yelling over the whirling howl “we’ll get the kids, help your wife with the carriage.”.

With their help we moved quickly across the rest of the bridge into the parking lot and our car.  There was no time to thank the couple, as everyone needed to get to safety.  With no escape possible from the incoming funnel cloud, my parents laid us all down between them in the back of our station wagon, their arms entwined to protect us and life jackets and boat tarps on top of us, praying for salvation that the tornado would miss us.  Time passed slowly in our heads as the car clock ticked, the minutes seemed endless.  Then everything was silent.  The howling and rocking abruptly stopped.  The sky turned white and then light blue.  The storm had passed and with the all clear, we drove home.

My mother later told me it was the longest ride of her life.  All she wanted to do was cry in release from the tension and fear she felt, but parents need to stay strong for their kids.  So she held steadfast for the rest of the day.  When everyone was in bed, she snuck down the stairs and sat alone in the dark, quietly purging the pent up feelings.  It was over.