It's been a long winter and life has taken so many turns and twists that I can hardly remember them all. Despite tornadoes being an annual occurrence in South Carolina, September 2024 brought one of the most horrific storms ever to strike the South-eastern side of the United States . What should have been a trip of less than two hours from my home to my mother's took more than five hours.
Not much scares me, but to turn down road after road and see only miles of downed trees, twisted, broken poles, and dangling transformers with no way to get through was eye-opening to say the least. I ended up taking roads I didn't know existed. Despite modern technology and a 4-wheel drive vehicle, I was left in awe of just how vulnerable we humans really are in the presence of Mother Nature's power.
These are my own pictures. We were lucky....very lucky. So little damage compared to what others' suffered.
I brought my mother to our house after the storm hit hers. A leaky roof, a damaged well, cows who astonishingly couldn't outrun a falling tree.....that's all our family had to deal with.
But, the impact on my mother has been quite another thing. She turned 94 in November after the storm. The damage to her mind has been much more devastating. While she had begun to drift mentally through her 93rd year, it wasn't anything to be overly concerned about. We could all laugh and remind her she was getting older and a fading memory was excusable. But from that day forward, her mind began to crumble.
It's almost spring now, and I can safely say that her mind will never be the same. She no longer knows what day of the week it is....or what season. She's pretty sure she isn't in her home of more than fifty years, but she's never sure exactly where she's living now. Sometimes she isn't even sure where she's sitting at the moment. She still recognizes me, but a new person or a changed schedule throws her into a paranoia that is difficult to comprehend.
We humans are far more fragile than we like to believe. Far easier to be impacted by factors beyond our control. Far more susceptible to outside forces than we want to admit.
Hug your loved ones and never underestimate what a treasure your memories might be.
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