Sometimes it seems there is no news in this province but the weather. I have farming relatives who talk of nothing but temperature, precipitation and wind and in situations when I'm not sure how to break the ice and start a conversation it almost always gives me something to talk about.
I spend a fair amount of the summer on the road and sometimes I miss storms at home and sometimes I live through them in campgrounds, at family members' homes and even in the vehicle. In the past if there was a storm at home I might not even have known until I pulled into town and saw branches on the roads or an overabundance of water in the gutters.
There are usually only four or five communities listed on the radio when there is some sort of weather disturbance on the way and our little town seems to be on the list with the cities more often than other places.
This week we heard a weather warning and my husband had a text messaging conversation with a neighbour who gave him a minute by minute update as the sound of wind and hail battered his house and he sat in his basement. Very soon after the storm was over I was able to see photographs on Facebook and read about my friends' experiences with the elements.
My imagination was running wild hoping windows, shingles and vehicles would be safe from damage. I pictured pock-marked roofs on the car and truck sitting in the driveway and had an awful vision of the neighbour's camper turned over on top of my VW Beetle.
One of the problems with hearing my community's name on the radio is the possibility my mother and other family members will also hear it and start to worry. They know the town is relatively small and if there is damage there is a possibility it could be happening to us.
Earlier in the month we returned from a weekend away to learn another neighbour's trampoline had been flipped over by the wind and we speculated on the worst possible scenarios. As we drove closer to home my stomach muscles tightened and I was a little worried calculating home and vehicle damage in my head. As we pulled onto our street it was calm and quiet and we could see some broken branches. We approached the house to find a broken poplar tree, the downspout ripped from the side of the house and lawn furniture, bikes and the barbecue out of place.
The fear was worse than the findings and although it will take a little effort to clean the damage up everything is much better than the bits of information I got while still on the road made me imagine and everything is just fine.
