I remember looking at the radar and seeing a green stretch with a big red blob in it with a purple circle in the middle of that and a black circle in the middle of the purple circle, meaning no rain there, just a see-through area that showed down to the color of the base map. There was already a report of a tornado on the ground in bandera. The storm system was moving from bandera to my town and i figured this purple circle with no rain falling in the absolute middle was probably where the tornado would be, right? As i watched the diagonal trajectory of the storm system i realized that it was either going to skirt right below us by a hair strand’s width or the purple bit would hit us head on and we’d go through the full length of the red blob as it passed over us, blessing us with this purple circle misfortune. I called my neighbor and enlightened her as to my realization, sending her the screenshot of the map. as it turned out, it did not slide under us. It hit us head on, blessed us with the purple blob, and made us endure the entire length of the red hail-containing blob that housed it. As i watched in horror, this thing scooted over us in no particular hurry for twenty whole minutes. Just like the hailstorm that put dents in and broke the tail lights of my last car, it hailed for twenty minutes straight…11 of which were furious and unceasing and 9 of which were quieter and dropped occasional baseballs or golf balls here or there instead of ceaseless peas, dimes, and quarters. I had just totaled my old car hitting a deer and bought a new used car which was parked under the carport outside but with twenty straight minutes of hail, you never know how a car is faring under a flimsy carport. I was praying and asking friends for prayer that the windows and the car survived the hail storm when an alert on my phone told me that a tornado was on the ground in my town. I guessed it was probably the same one that had so nicely traveled over from bandera and in all likelihood it was probably in that purple circle on the radar. I checked the radar map on my phone and noted that the purple blob was sitting directly over my location. We were no longer experiencing any rain. However, occasionally there would be the loudest “BANG” as a baseball or golf ball sized portion of ice descended from the sky and struck either the roof or the carport. I realized that we were probably experiencing the middle of the purple blob, where there had been no rain shown. Where there’s a break in the rain and the largest balls of hail, there you will find the tornado. The wind whipped against the house outside, moaning and whistling like an eerie siren song. I unzipped the mosquito net tent over the bed and tied the flap up out of the way as quickly as i could. I grabbed Sili first. As i lifted her onto the mattress, i tried to be gentle with her now arthritic joints. I had flashbacks to the first year we lived on the homestead, hiding under the mattress to avoid our first tornado with bags of rice shielding our legs and my back from any possible flying debris that might come through the window, watching the curtains sway with the wind even though no doors or windows were open. We were all younger then. Cashew was a baby. Sili wasn’t elderly yet. We were young and limber and didnt have to worry about hip dysplasia or arthritis. Now the three of us were old ladies and couldnt bend like younguns anymore. I laid sili in the bed and then went for cashew. I lifted her into the bed and climbed in behind her. I zipped the mesh tent closed and huddled both dogs against me in the middle of the mattress, trying not to allow their nails to snag the mesh on the outside of the tent. Cashew was shaking and drooling everywhere. Both dogs were flailing their legs about trying to stand up or reposition. I pinned them to the mattress and petted their fur firmly while we layed there. The alert continued its air-raid siren warning on the phone “tornado on the ground”. I texted a couple people asking for prayer and put the phone down next to us in the bed while i held the dogs. It was silence and then “BANG” for a while, which was eerie. Then we must have reached the other edge of the purple circle because all the rain and the smaller assortment of hail began again. It sounded like the apocalypse out there. The hail was so loud and it went on seemingly forever! Every once in a while a hail ball would bounce up and hit the metal door or a window and i had the thought, “i dont know how much longer the windows and the carport will hold.” I just wanted the hail to stop, but it dragged on. I prayed aloud, asking Jesus to protect us and spare the car and windows.
When all was said and done, i opened the door to this sight.
The hail balls punched holes in the mailbox lid, tore more holes in the rain water collection container lids, smashed up all the plants on the porch…especially the aloe vera, and dented the carport.
The yard was flooded but something else began happening as the ice balls started melting. An eerie mist started rising from where the ice balls were melting and the property became covered in fog. It had the same effect as the mist in the bathroom when someone takes a very hot shower. Now the view of everything was obstructed and seemed to be shrouded in mist, causing everything to be blurred or out of focus. I traipsed about the yard in my flip flops with the head lamp trying to see what was damaged. Both potted pecan trees were laying on their sides strewn about the yard. They’d been ripped off the shed porch and moved about twenty feet.
The window unit had yet more hail damage to add to the storm damage from the last time it hailed.
The yard was flooded. The car was covered in debris all the way to its roof but it appeared dent free and crack free, just very dirty. The carport did its job and looked as if it had been through it but didnt allow any hail balls to fall through. I would assess those dents on another day in the daylight. I was grateful to my friend who had prayed for us. It seemed that twenty minute hail storms were becoming the norm more than a historic event. I knew the weather wasnt playing and if we were going to live here long term, i needed to come up with a better plan than what we just did. I could have thrown the dogs in the car and made a run for san antonio, but that was the only nearby city that didnt also get creamed by some part of the storm before or after us. It would have been an hour’s drive there and an hour back, and the trunk was full of feed bags and not ready to house the dogs. Living out here without a garage or storm shelter really is living by prayer. The weather can always take everything you worked for in two seconds. The Lord was good to us and we did not get to see the tornado. Eventually the storm moved on and the dogs and i licked our wounds about the window unit and carport roof. Somehow, the chicken pen roofs survived; probably thanks to the cedar branches catching the hail balls above it on the way down.
