So that's what the sirens are for

Last night was filled with excitement. We fell under a tornado watch at about 2PM. By 7:00 we were under T-storm warnings and it was raining pretty hard.

We sent the kids to bed and sat down for an evening of the Daily Show and the Colbert Show. The rain got harder and harder, but there were no noticeable winds. Then there was hail. Not bad, but we heard a few bangs on the window.

At about 10 after 8, the tornado warning was flashed on the screen. I turned to DH and asked if we should get down to the basement and he brushed me off. He it totally convinced that there is no chance at tornadoes her. My personal opinion is that if there have been tornadoes in upstate NY and MA, the chances here, at the edge of tornado country are higher. When I talk to neighbors, I get mixed responses. Some take the threat seriously, others laugh. One neighbor told me that the sirens have never even gone off here in our city. Another neighbor told me how worried she is that she doesn't have a basement. She lives in a trilevel but the bottom level is not very deep. I invited her to join us any time the sirens go off. The intriguing thing about this is that both women grew up in this area.

So, minutes after DH laughed at me, the sirens went off. I was disturbed by the fact that I could barely hear them over the rain and the TV. I had to open the door to make sure I was hearing what I thought I was hearing. Each month, on the first Monday at 12:00PM, they test the sirens, and I always thought they were so loud. Not in the middle of a rain storm though.

Still there was no wind. I turned to DH again and said, we need to get down to the basement. He laughed again and told me I was being silly. That's what the sirens are for though. they set them off when a tornado has been spotted in the area. I insisted that he run upstairs to get the boys and I would try to get the cats and dog down. The dog was a little frightened, the cats would have nothing to do with any of it.

DH went upstairs to get the boys and soon, Lastborn was walking down the cellar stairs looking sleepy and disoriented. DH asked if the neighbors had a cellar and if he should invite them over. I said they did not and agreed that he should. Still no Firstborn down in the cellar. DH ran out to talk to the neighbors. Soon I heard hearty laughter from DH and the neighbors. I began to wonder if the sirens were really meant to warn you. But I stayed with Lastborn. Still no Firstborn.

I ran upstairs and called him again leaving poor Lastborn to hold onto the dog who had woken up fully and was getting frisky at this point.

Firstborn was still upstairs in nothing but his underpants looking very disoriented. I had to really insist that he get down cellar. I don't know why he took his bathrobe off though. He sleeps in in, so he should have had more than his underpants on.

Within a few minutes DH was back and shortly after, the neighbor and her niece joined us. The neighbor was carrying a glass of wine. The niece had just flown in at 3PM from Minnesota. She's not used to tornado warnings either. Apparently, they had been on their back porch all evening, drinking wine and watching the sky turn black.

Thankfully, Firstborn was still not awake enough to be mortified that he was sitting there in nothing but his underpants. But I sensed some discomfort from him, so I found something to cover him up with. I couldn't find the bucket of blankets that I had down there. Luckily, we had one blanket that the movers had left and I had grabbed the throw that we use in the family room. So we were warm enough.

The sirens remained on for about 15 minutes. Just enough time for all of us to nervously joke about the situation. We explained to the boys that there is nothing to fear and if the tornadoes were really close we would hear winds. It was pretty still outside. Just occasional gentle gusts of wind. We have had storms come through here that scare the begeebers out of me. The winds from storms are much higher here than back in the east. They say that a tornado sounds like a freight train, but some of the storms we have had sound like a freight train. DH sleeps right through them, and I stay awake with the TV on waiting for the tornado warnings and watches. It freaks me out.


After the sirens stopped, we put the kids back to bed and brought Nova out in the rain, because of course all this happened when she had been sleeping for a couple of hours. We were at her bladder limit when we entered the cellar. We couldn't wait any longer. As we stood outside with the neighbor, she pointed out the winds. Some were cold and others were hot. Little gusts of differently temperatured air coming from different directions. That's the stuff tornadoes are made of. She was right. It was eerie feeling it.

We are still under watch right now and will be until 3PM. But most of the storm has passed. A second wave came through at about 7:20. Just as the boys were getting ready to get on the bus. And indeed, as the bus came down our street, it got so dark out that it looked like night. I had a hard time even letting them walk the two doors from our house to the bus. There was lightening and thunder. Nothing too close, but still. It was just dark out.

I'm glad we had this warning last night. It helped me see that we are very ill prepared for these middle of the night warnings. 1) We need a weather radio. The cable went out right after the sirens stopped last night. So I had no way to keep track of the storm. I'm also not certain that the sirens would wake me at night. 2) I need to find that box of blankets. 3) I think I'll stash a bottle of wine and some glasses down there. No use being uncomfortable. 4) It's time to finish the basement. Walls would be a good thing between the corner we are hiding in and the french doors at the other side of the basement.

Now, this is not my first tornado story in Ohio. The other was pretty funny too.

When I drove up to Akron for DI State competition with another DI family, we made conversation the entire 3 hours. One of the things I was talking about was how freaked out tornadoes make me. She thought the whole thing was pretty funny. Again, she grew up here. She never takes cover when the sirens go off.

By the time we arrived outside of Akron, the rain had gotten pretty bad and the winds were howling. Just another Ohio storm I thought. I dropped Firstborn, my friend and her two kids off at the hotel entrance with our bags and went to park the car.

The walk back was complicated by the driving winds and rain. It was the kind of night where an umbrella would do no good; it would just crumple in the wind.

I ran back to the hotel entrance. All of the kids staying there for the competition were still up. It was 11PM. We had talked about sending our team (all of the city teams rode a bus up earlier in the day) to bed early because they were on for competition at 8am. But they were all still up in the hallway. There must have been about 100 people in the main hall of the hotel. My travelling companion and the kids were all laughing. I asked about the kids being up and one of her daughters blurted out, "they are up because of the tornado." My travelling companion laughed and responded, "you weren't supposed to tell her." She thought it was a lark after our conversation that we had driven right into the middle of a tornado warning.

I can laugh now...