A little over a week ago a tornado ripped through my city. Now, I’m from California and am used to earthquakes, fires, and droughts, so when I hear people talk about tornados, I think of that movie “Twister” and the absolute destruction that was left in the wake of each of those storms. Apparently the tornado that we had was small, an EF-1 on the scale of tornado strength and whatnot. Which means that the winds were anywhere from 89-110 MPH. Small. Cute even, in tornado talk. Well, my husband was home during the storm, and while he wasn’t afraid the house was going to fall down, he did witness the 30-40 foot trees across the street fall down like they were dominoes. I was at a friend’s house a couple of miles south from my house with my kids, where hail and wind came, but nothing exceptionally alarming.
About an hour after the tumult had ended, I got my kids in the car and we went home. While we drove through my friend’s neighborhood and looked around, it looked just like a hail storm had come through. Green leaves on the ground and some disheveled bushes. When we got to my neighborhood though, my street, so beautifully lined with mature trees just a couple of hours before, was unrecognizable. Trees leaning on houses, lamp posts on the ground. Trees in the streets and on sidewalks. Fences fallen over. Devastation. Thankfully, the houses were pretty much all intact, save for some roof tiles and shingles in driveways. It was about 5pm when we got home. While my house had incurred some damage to the siding and trim, our trees were still standing and there was very little cleanup to be done on our property. So, my kids and I went down the street to work on picking up the trees fallen at a neighbor’s house who was out of town.
As I did my best to clear their driveway with my 6 children all working beside me I was overcome with how big of a job clearing just the 2 trees in the front yard was going to be. We had a rake and some clippers, that was all and my husband had gone to clear someone else’s house who needed help. In that moment, a man pulled up in his truck and said, “Do you guys need some help?” To which I replied, “Well, this isn’t my house, but we’re just trying to clear up as much as we can.” He nodded and said, “Well, I have a chainsaw and some kids to help out if you’ll let us.” I immediately nodded and said, “That would be awesome!!!” So this man got out of his truck with his 3 kids, all of whom put on some work gloves and grabbed tools from the back and got started working with us. I’m guessing the kids were 14, 12, and 10–give or take a year.
As we worked I asked one of the kids where they lived and if their house got hit hard. They said that they lived in a completely different city away from the tornado. They saw and heard what had happened and they packed up their truck with tools and gloves and decided to drive around until they found somewhere that needed them. I was overwhelmed with gratitude at the amazing example this family was. We worked together for 4 hours cutting up and hauling branches and logs to a pile out of the way. They helped us clear an elderly neighbor’s driveway as well. They only left when it was clear there was no more to be done in the dark.
Over the course of the next 3 days I went out to various houses with my family, my husband and kids ages 14, 13, 11, 8, 6, and 4 and hauled debris, raked up leaves, bagged branches, and filled trailers with wood. So many trees, so much sap. They estimate that more 16,000 trees were felled from the tornado. So sad! We are all tired and sore, but so happy to have helped the community. I do not share this in order to get a pat on the back. So many volunteers helped out, it was definitely a community effort, we are just glad to have been a very small part of it!
I share this because while there were several awesome encounters that we had with people, that first family taught me a profound lesson. I don’t know that I would have thought to pack up my family with tools and work gloves to go and clean up trees in a different city than my own before this experience. However, having been on the receiving end of such selfless kindness, I have been taught to broaden my definition of loving my neighbor. Moreover, while I am not hoping for another natural disaster to come through my community or even the neighboring communities, I’m glad that my family got to experience firsthand the power of a group of people working together in such a beautiful, difficult way.
That first family though. I want to be like them when I grow up. Here’s to going out and loving our neighbors before the next tornado hits!
Kayleen
