my city

I love the weather. I've even written about my love of thunderstorms in this blog. When I was in high school, I wanted to be a meteorologist. And until I saw how much math and science it would require in college, my post-college plans were to go work for the National Hurricane Center. I've experienced a hurricane before, as well as a few tropical depressions and storms, so I'm really no stranger to the whole thing.

But this was different. Very different.

I'll never forget the noise that the house made when we finally lost power. It was right before midnight. There was a surge of energy, and then a strange screaming sound. I even asked my mom who was yelling outside. No joke. I thought that was probably the worst of it. But I was wrong.

Around 4:00 a.m., I was really afraid. It was a kind of fear I've never really felt before, where you have no control of mother nature. I started to question everything -- all the decisions I had made as far as riding out the storm, where the safest place to be in the house was, whether or not I should wake up Aidan and move him, whether or not the house would continue to hold up (which it did, thank God), and just about every other thought that came in my mind. And just about when I thought I couldn't take anymore, Ty called and informed me that the hurricane-force winds hadn't even hit us yet. I felt sick.

Finally things did start to die down, and the winds began to fade. And in place of Hurricane Ike, the first cool front of the year blew into the Houston area. Not to sound sacreligious or anything, but it was almost as though God felt like he must owe us a break. Thank goodness, because the temperatures were stifling in the house without air conditioning.

We're cleaning up now, but my city is wounded. We're still without electricity, but we're so blessed. So many people lost everything, including their lives. It's going to be a long time before things are "normal" again. Ty is here, and it made all the difference in the world -- Aidan has his daddy for a while, and I have my best friend. It makes things a whole lot easier to take.