The Days of Ike

It was a long couple days leading up to Ike. We received a call at 7:20 a.m. on Thursday from our Canadian friends down the street. We joke with them about being hurricane rookies. :) Anyhow, they were needing some help boarding up the house, so after Chris and I both worked half days, we started pounding away at the wood. Chris being a chemist and myself being a pastor, it soon became quite evident the neither of us were carpenters. So, the phone call to master handy man Roland was made.

3 hours later, boards were up and the Canadians were ready to ride the storm. Roland proceeded to board his house with help from some 8 year olds and then he helped my mother-in-law with hers. While boarding in the early afternoon, I took call from a friend needing some "hurricane worthy" relationship counseling. So, Mel and I cleared our calendars and had the lovely couple over Thursday night.

We continued helping with boarding on Friday...all the while my house was taped with X's. :) One of the 8 year olds that was helping us was clowning on me for taping the windows with an X. He said, "Ike is going to be blowing through, then come up to my house and see the X's and turn and go the other way." I told him they were holy X's taped and filled with the Holy Spirit and ready to take on Evil Ike. He looked at me oddly.

My wife and I decided to take our friend Peter up on his offer to crash at his empty house that was already boarded up. We were very grateful!

Now, the day after...we had power by 3:00 p.m. and I only had one casualty...my front yard tree. I think we had power so quickly because we live a mile from a hospital one way and a mile from a sherriff's station and prison the other way.

My brother is on his way over now with his kids. They live in Katy and the power is still out there. He said the kids were tossing and turning in their sleep because they were so hot. Reminds me of my summer in Spain. No AC...sleeping with the windows open. I didn't sleep well that summer.

So, we have no church services tomorrow, so maybe we'll join some friends at the one nearest our house. We'll see...

Oh, and looking at my phone, I had about 30 texts going throughout the storm. I can't imagine texting like that if I didn't have a full keyboard phone. What did I do before these days of technology?

I know many others had it worse than us. So many people lost everything. I'm grateful tonight.