And the tree tree tree came down down down

Friday night's storm was a humdinger of a hullabaloo. A little strip of nonsense at the bottom of the television screen as Syen and I watched the USA finals for gymnastics and swimming, when the wind started blowing sideways against the house and making the screens bulge and strain. I walked to the other end of the house and opened the french doors to the deck, my suspicions that the little thunderstorm they mentioned in passing may be more than nature kicking up her heels on a hot summer night.

The door tore from my hands as I saw leaves swirling the deck 25 ft off the ground, the girls thought I was mad to block them from going outside to see what was happening as the sky grew dark and a crash of distant thunder alerted my ears. I herded them away from the windows and checked on daughter #4 as she struggled with the garage door, she'd gone to make sure the dogs were safe and inside, and that door too ripped from our hands. I counted silently: power outage in 3...2...  

I didn't make it to one. 

I'm usually prepared for storms. Candles lit, flashlights at the ready and six gallons of water perched on the kitchen counter ready for brushing teeth and to bbq coffee the next morning if need be. This one caught me and the weatherman by surprise. I shuffled the girls off to bed while Bryan and I went to bed early and listened to the forest creak around us. An hour later, I heard the soft whooosh of a tree falling nearby. We have five acres on a mountain of trees, it could have been any of them. 

While it's very convenient firewood, I don't like to think about how the base of that tree is 30ft from my bedroom.

The girls loved it. A new plaything while we faced another 97* day and I marveled how it missed being anything more than giant shrubbery now.

The next four days passed in a dismal haze of extreme heat, library runs, clogged toilets, and questionable showers snuck in at the county pool. Last night, the mountain made the list of getting back on the grid and we fell back into routine: showers, air conditioning, and food that came easily from a container that wasn't eyed with suspicion.