Praising in the Storm

Yesterday I mentioned the nasty storm that rolled (slammed) through Fort Wayne on Friday. After coming home, calming down, and thinking more about it...I had some observations that I think deserve their own post, so I'm interrupting my vacation chatter to tell you about this.

* I hate storms. HATE storms. Never loved them, came to entirely hate them after the tornado of 1997 and spent several years actually paralyzed in fear every time even the tiniest storm came along. I'm much better now. Ironically the Greensburg tornado taught me that if the big one REALLY does happen, you can't stop it...and life can be rebuilt. So a lot of the fears went away after that. Having said that...I still hate storms and while I can now make it through a regular thunderstorm without incident, I freak out in really bad storms.

*91 mile an hour winds constitute a "really bad storm." And that's exactly what Fort Wayne got on Friday. And because of that, I'm not going to feel bad about crying at work.

* My car was parked under a tree. A nice, young, healthy tree, to be honest, but I also don't think 91 mile an hour winds care much about which trees are young and healthy. Trees are trees and the fine city lost a great number of them on Friday. Thankfully NOT the one perched above my car.

* The roof leaked right above my desk. And by leaked, I mean a waterfall. Water poured down for about 5 minutes before we found a satisfactory tub to catch it (at which point we caught about an inch in a 66 quart tote). Had this storm happened even 2 hours later, we would have been gone from work, and the water would have soaked into all the books on that shelf, ruining them.

* It's been weeks since I had to stay late to work, but Friday night, Lynne and I were scheduled to take food to the Party Palooza winner's party. At the regular quitting time for work, I could not have gotten home, because that way were closed...because of overturned vehicles and downed trees. By the time I finished working the party and headed home, the road was open again.

* 50,000 people and businesses were out of power after the storm. Our party was scheduled to be held at a store near one mall and the restaurant catering the meal was in another mall. Though power was out all around both malls, those two particular businesses had power and the party went on as scheduled.

You can't tell me God doesn't care about the details. Even if, in the grand scheme of life, they're completely insignificant.