Shop Products
Houzz Logo Print
shear_stupidity

Story

shear_stupidity
11 years ago

So there I was. After recently spending an entire weekend re-potting everything into 5-1-1 mix, I was feeling pretty good about myself. Until...

We got that storm on Sunday the 24th here in Central Florida. One minute I was skimming the pool, the next I was ducking for cover and running to the house.

That storm was tumultuous. (I love that word and rarely get to use it) The rain drops were the size of toads. The 65 mpg wind gusts a reminder of hurricanes of yore. The hail a shocking addition to an already crazy afternoon.

From my vantage point on the lanai, I watched in horror as three separate fence panels disappeared. I prayed while staring, awestruck, at the Live Oaks twisting in the melee, that they wouldn't split and come crashing down.

I tried to calm my granddaughters who were spending their Easter vacation with us, while keeping my eye on the downpour.

The pool was filling, then over-filling, with alarming speed. The water in the waterfall, determined to keep flowing, was blowing sideways onto the lawn. The gate slammed open. The back door to my porch slammed shut.

Plantling trays flew away into the yard. Teak furniture fell over. (It fell the hell over!) All of my freshly bloomed Amaryllis laid down and tried to blend in with the ground. Small twigs fell from the trees and pierced Elephant Ear and Canna leaves alike.

And then it stopped, as suddenly as it had started.

I ventured out to assess the damage. Resin and iron figures that normally perch on my waterfall were drowning in the pool, which had so many leaves from nearby trees sunk to the bottom of it that it looked like I was growing shrubs underwater. A new planter that is almost to heavy to carry when empty had fallen over and dumped it's Tibouchina onto the pathway.

That's when I noticed that 5-1-1 mix was everywhere. EVERYwhere! Since the wind blew BEFORE the rain came, it just blew the mix out of the pots and all over the yard, garden, path, pool, you name it.

In the 10-15 minutes it took this storm to start and stop, I learned that no matter how hard I try, no matter how much work I do in my yard, and no matter how often I obsess over having an immaculate back yard, God has other ideas.

I was reminded of that same lesson again today while watching my 6-year-old granddaughter meticulously draw a Teenaged Mutant Ninja Turtle on a chalkboard, and when she got up to go get another colored piece of chalk, my almost-2-year-old granddaughter walked casually up to the chalkboard and wiped her hand across it.

Ya just gotta laugh, right?

Comments (13)

  • kayjones
    11 years ago

    Yes - you can cry or you can shrug your shoulders and move on. I prefer to SCREAM!

  • loufloralcityz9
    11 years ago

    Sounds like an everyday 'what next' normal day in Florida, count your blessings..... some people had sinkholes!

    Lou

  • shear_stupidity
    Original Author
    11 years ago

    That was the first storm of its kind since we put in the pool, patio, fence, and potted plants and things. It was also a little eye-opener as far as what all I'll need to secure or store during a tropical storm or hurricane.

  • Michael AKA Leekle2ManE
    11 years ago

    I've only been a fan of his for about a year and a half, but I like Mr. Jimmy Buffett's advice:

    "Breathe in, breathe out, move on."

    Don't lament on the disaster, but look at the promise of new, future projects. Still, I feel a bit robbed. We didn't see any of that up here, just enough rain to almost, not quite, top off my rain barrel.

  • slopfrog
    11 years ago

    That super windy day cost me every single mango growing on my mystery tree. The same thing happened last year, and I still have no idea what it is. Maybe next year...

  • shear_stupidity
    Original Author
    11 years ago

    Love me some Buffet, Leekle! I feel robbed, too. A bunch of Amaryllis had JUST opened the previous day and now they're toast. My oh-so-fragile Gardenia blooms, which have NEVER opened before, were beaten off the shrub and are now laying on the ground. My fancy-schmancy Geraniums had just flowered for the first time.
    Yes, I shall focus on future projects, but I'll always look back and remember fondly how naive I was, thinking I'd gotten a head start on Spring cleanup this year.
    Slopfrog, oh no! That would so completely stink!

  • thetradition
    11 years ago

    Weather like that happens every afternoon in the summer. This was indeed a nice dress rehearsal for t-storm season.

  • jane__ny
    11 years ago

    We haven't had a drop of rain in Sarasota. Everything is so dry, my lawn looks like a brown field.

    Great story, Sheer! You have a talent for writing. You should send your story to the local paper. I bet they publish it.

    Jane

  • shear_stupidity
    Original Author
    11 years ago

    Thanks, Jane! I love to write and have always wanted to do it for a living, but I hate rejection too much to try it.
    LOL!

  • shear_stupidity
    Original Author
    11 years ago

    Forgot the picture...

  • jane__ny
    11 years ago

    That would happen in NY. I'd have all my orchids outside for the summer. After a thunderstorm, they would get blown all over. I had patio furniture floating in the pool. We had a 2nd story deck with patio furniture. I would always close the umbrella when a storm approached. One particular storm, blew open the umbrella carrying it and the table off the deck and wound up in some trees near my neighbors property.

    The table had a glass top and was shattered. The umbrella wound up about 30 ft up a large white pine.

    Looked like something out of the Wizard of Oz!

    Jane

  • Michael AKA Leekle2ManE
    11 years ago

    Okay... now we're getting into freaky winds....

    When Hurricane Hugo came through South Carolina, he came over our little town of Sumter. My dad and my brother went out during the eye and said it was awesome. They didn't think to wake me up to share in the experience. But anyways, the next morning we woke up and checked the yard. At the time my dad had one of those wobbly aluminum sheds that was little more than a few sheets of aluminum tethered to a wooden pallet floor. Hugo or one of his off-spring tornadoes managed to grab the shed lift it up and set it down two yards down in that neighbor's pool. Not a big deal in itself. The funny part is that everything that was in the shed was still there. The lawn mower, the weed trimmer even the bottles of oil and herbicides were still standing on their shelves. Hugo just thought it would be fun to remove the outer shell and leave everything else. What a jokester Hugo was.

  • shear_stupidity
    Original Author
    11 years ago

    I lived in South Carolina during Hugo. I was married to a Marine, so we were stationed in Beaufort. We were told to evacuate and "head north... to Charleston." I kept saying, "But it looks like it's going to HIT Charleston." Well, we headed north and inland until we realized that if we didn't stop driving soon, we'd never get a hotel room. We got a cheap room someplace and stayed the night. The next morning when we were ready to check out, we found that a huge pine tree had fallen across the tops of the cabs of two full-sized pickup trucks, which saved our little Dodge Charger from getting so much as a scratch on it, as we were parked between the two trucks.