JUST PONDERING
(Re-post: Written August 23, 2026 as commentary on the July 2026 Tea Room Quotes page,)
⛈️
🌪️
July 17th, early in the evening. the storm hit. It was suppose to be a strong storm but turned out to be so much more. Fortunately I had put the daily quote up early that morning. Also fortunate, we had eaten supper early. It was a good windy storm, so we weren't surprised when we lost power. Usually they have power back on within hours, so that is what we expected of this outage. However, this was not your typical outage. Turns out an EF1 Tornado had hit in area all around us. Actually several Tornados had a come through in a short span of time. Fortunately, they skipped over my home and property... but not the electrical wires that connect us to the outside world!
There were massive outages and it took 10 days to get our electric and fiber Internet back online (27th, noon). My original plan had been to fill in the daily quotes missed during the storm outage. I finally found time to catch up. I collected my pictures and put them up first. I filled in the 18th and was about to fill in the other days, but as I looked at the pictures with no quotes they conjured the feelings of my 10 days with no electricity and no communication. In looking at the pictures with no quotes, I felt the stillness of those days. Hoping each day that the electric and internet would come back on, and being disappointed and anxious each day it did not.
We had enough food and water and a camper with a propane stove, so we were okay and did not have the need to leave our property. Electric was restored around day 8 and internet day 10. The pictures were all taken the day after the electric and internet were restored, when we finally ventured out. Clean up had been well underway and these are just some pictures of the damage not addressed yet. From neighbors reports these pictures are tame compared to the damage that had actually happened.
I always like to say that quotes are more than words - They are messages expressing life experiences. I realized, and decided, that the quiet lack of words can be as expressive as using audible written word. I feel that the lack of quotes expresses the quietness and mystery of not being able to communicate with the outside world,,, when that is what you have been programed to do continuously.
So... Quotes of silence for the EF1 Tornado Storm of July 2026.
🌪️ ⛈️ 🌪️
