A Safe Haven

Today I am walking around "zombie like" after driving more than 10 hours to get to safety and more than 7 hrs. to get back home. Turns out, it wasn't safe at all in many ways. We were involved in a mass exodus and unless you have been in one there should be no comments like, "Well even though the storm didn't do what it was predicted to do, you did the right thing." Since I love doing new things at least once and survive, I am sure that after I recuperate that I will say, "Never again but I have that notch on my belt too." We were trapped, no way out, all we could do was go with the flow. In spurts, the traffic would start moving until you were forced to travel at 75mph to 85mph and you found yourself flying to "safety". I remember that I hydroplaned a couple of times after the rainstorm but Hey! What the heck! I was safe. Another incident, a semi in the far left lane came to a stop and another semi that was near moved next to it and stopped. Our lanes started moving slowly and as I glanced to the left there was a car laying on its side. My daughter asked later if I saw the man that ran in front of her and she almost hit him. Because we had to keep moving, we don't know if he made it or not. In another wreck a 2yr. old child was killed. I am sure that there were many more that we didn't hear about. I wouldn't let any of the 5 grandkids ride with me but I took Judge, the family dog. I worried about him but thought maybe if I had a wreck that possibly he would survive as he was asleep on the backseat and thus relaxed. As for me, I was tense and if I wasn't killed from the intial crash the 300lbs. of pressure from the airbag would have finished the job. Later we all talked about the nonsense of running from predicted danger to real danger. We concluded that for us, it is safer at home.

Our lodgings were a big disappointment, we found ourselves still trying to survive. When we arrived at the hotel and were paying for our rooms, we were told that if any of you smoke in the rooms there will be a $250 dollar fine. I could almost hear the cash register bells going off. Dogs can stay in the room and we all know that no matter how clean the dog, they smell like a dog but the smell of a cigarette is more offensive to what seems like the majority of people. Many hotels serve a complimentary Continental breakfast and the one we stayed at did too but we arrived late, 130AM Monday morning and missed the breakfast because we needed sleep more than food. So Tuesday morning when we were preparing to leave I went to ask if the breakfast was still being served and it was so I told the man that we would be down shortly and he called after me, "It is no longer complimentary, you have to pay for it." I didn't see any security at all. A couple of times I had to go to my car for an item and a feeling of dread would wash over me that there was no protection for me but I am sure that if I had drank one of the three bottles of water in my room that were tagged with a note that said, "If you drink this bottle of water, it will cost you $3.", that a siren would have sounded. I think that FEMA is still reimbursing these hotels and they are being fleeced but the people who are fleeing to maybe find a safer place are sometimes being mistreated.

I was anxious to get home to assess the damage and this is all I found in my backyard.