A very unmerry birthday to me.

What did I get for my birthday? Tornadoes that killed dozens. My dislike of my state of residence has turned vehement once again.

We're safe. The Lord protected us, and the only "damage" we had was the miraculous fixing of a gate that was stuck. The wind unstuck it! The first supercell held onto its tornado until it passed over us.

We all slept in the basement, just in case, though. Well, those of us who did sleep, that is. I stayed in the basement through the first supercell storm, but once it settled down, I came back upstairs to see what the news was saying about further storms. There were four more, but by the time they reached us, none were as bad as that first one. But they were much, much worse for others.

My emotionally sensitive child was very, very freaked out by the storm. We had prayed and discussed what we would do, even held a very brief "what to do if" session. I didn't want anyone focusing on the what if, but I wanted them to know that God was protecting us and I had a plan. That all worked well until the lightning hit. The sky lit up like daytime—no, daylight is warm and yellow, this was a harsh blue light that was quite otherworldly. Anyway, it was bright as day, and didn't dim for fifteen minutes. There were flickers where some smaller bolts would hit, but the largest bolts were continuous. We had the blinds shut, but the light came into the room like moonbeams.

To comfort her, I made up a story about a firefly convention just outside the window. How ours was chosen to be the most friendly window in all of Tennessee, so the fireflies met in front of it to discuss their summer plans. Many had woken up in the 70° weather earlier in the day, and were quite confused as to why it was so warm in February. They talked about all the fun things they would do once summer really came: licking up spilled ice cream on the sidewalk, watching the fireworks and trying to recreate their patterns, watching the movie at the drive-in. Eventually the fireflies got sleepy and went back into their winter hibernation and the storm moved on.

I'm so thankful for God's care and protection, and I really, really hate it here.