Ike

No, this is not a new, radical diet plan or another attempt at cleaning and disinfecting my fridge... this is what my fridge looks like one week after a HURRICANE hit our area. Yes, a hurricane (Ike to be exact) blew through southwest Ohio last Sunday. I never in my life imagined that I would experience a hurricane since I live about a thousand miles from the ocean. I was bagging groceries for tips to raise money for Zoe's dance team when it began. The conveyor belts at the checkout lanes stopped and the lights went out but the cash registers and a few lights kicked on from a generator. We kept bagging and people kept shopping. I definitely earned my tips that day, that was a pain with no help from the conveyors, anyway... I finished my shift and on my drive home I noticed my van was feeling like it was lifting off the ground and there were trees down everywhere, street lights were out and it was eerily quiet. I tried calling Paul to see if there was a tornado warning or anything but our phone did not work. I was beginning to panic. It was taking me a long time to drive home because there were tree limbs everywhere. I got home and found we had no power and Paul and the kids were "playing" in the wind. We tried to listen to the radio but they were blasting music as usual. Five hours later, we learned it had been a hurricane and that all of Ohio was affected by the wind, strangely there was no rain. 84 of the 88 counties in Ohio were out of power. We packed up a few things and headed to my mom's house (she had power) and we lived liked displaced people for four days. We came home to feed our bird and let the kids play toys during the day and slept at my moms. It was a small picture of what can really happen in a natural disaster. We were forced out of our comfort zones for sure. People around the area are still waiting to get their power on (it's been over a week) and all the trees and bushes are losing their leaves early. Many people had damage to their homes, lost large trees, and there have been many people hurt (and killed) from falling tree limbs. I am so thankful we did not have any damage to our home and that we are ok. I will admit that I cried having to throw out 7 big giant garbage bags of food from our fridge (I had just gone shopping a day before the storm hit). It just makes you realize how comfortable your life really is... I sincerely hope this is the last time we have a storm like this one.