Tornado Alley

I grew up in Kansas, so you can basically say that I grew up in tornado alley. While I've lived my entire 30 years without actually seeing a tornado on the ground, I have seen the considerable damage that they can do. Even with seeing all of this damage, and knowing several people who lived in Greensburg and lost everything they owned, I didn't give tornadoes their due respect until this week.

I was in OKC in the House of Representatives Chambers at the State Capitol when the first tornado warnings were sounded earlier this week. Sure, it worried me a little, but at the time, I considered it more of an inconvenience than anything else - I knew these storms were going to keep me from getting home on time and that irritated me. In the end, we made it home, after multiple delays, basically no worse for the wear.

This evening, as I was watching the late news and seeing footage of the tornado that hit Lone Grove (part of the same storm that tore through this area), the reality of what I experienced on Tuesday and what I've always known, hit me: we sometimes take tornado warnings too lightly. Sure, we don't always need to panic when Gary England is yelling at us to take shelter, but I sometimes think that we need to look at the bigger picture. Just because we've never personally been hit doesn't mean that we won't be hit the next time. Just ask those people who lost everything in Lone Grive, or those in Greensburg, Picher, Moore, Andover, or anywhere else that has been hit.

I'm not an alarmist. When I was younger, I was terrified of tornadoes. Looking back, I can't say when that fear abated and I became jaded, but I think it was shortly after I weathered a tornado in Pratt in my best friend's basement. I think I lost my fear that evening when I heard that the hardest hit area of town was at Fifth and Jackson, right where I lived. Late that night when I got home, I didn't expect to find a house standing, but it was there, safe and sound, with the exception of needing a new roof from hail damage.

Perhaps it's time that I stand back and re-evaluate my stance on tornadoes. Just because I've been lucky this far doesn't mean that I'll always be lucky. It's just something to ponder.