Day Five… Part One. We Aren’t In Kansas Anymore!

 Well, where to begin!  

That wasn’t gentle rain, nor was it a nice wind.  Monsoon crossed with Tornado is what I felt as I got closer to King and William Streets.  From the crosswalk I could see all of the tarps that were to keep the rain off the tent were flapping in the wind like a flying dinasour!  Bungee and tent pegs flung all over the place and the tent lying down like it was afraid for its life!

So I did what I do… i put it all back together.  The best I could. And then I sought shelter. And tried to get dry and warm and reduce my anxiety level.

A friend met up with me and gave me a heated brick wrapped in a towel.  I’m learning to accept help when it is offered, so I accepted The Brick and hugged him for the warmth and it was amazing how much better i felt.

Ten o’clock arrived as it does and I was out again, walking toward the tent and saw it was pushed again and some pegs were loose so I redid them, pulled the one holding the tent poles straight a little tighter and thought that was the best i could do.

I crawled into the tent, the floor was soaking wet but my bedding was dry thanks to my habitual need to always keep it up off the floor.  I cleaned everything up the best i could, rearranged how my bedding was piled to keep me warm and it off the wet floor, covered myself with a thin piece of polyester tarp to keep me dry in case any rain came in and tried to sleep.  

I must have fallen asleep because when I awoke the tent looked really weird and the wind was howling like a banshee.  The tent collapsed AGAIN and I was so not wanting to deal with this again.  I took off my outer layer of clothes since I was running out of dry clothes to sleep in and went outside and looked at what was happening.  The wind had shifted and i had aligned the tent for the other wind and it was now pushing against the weakest side, therefore collapse.

I was angry, I was defeated, I was exhausted, and i was overwhelmed.  I knew I could go in the church, or up the street, or even just get in my car and drive home.  But I thought about the people who didn’t have anywhere near the camping stuff I did who had to go through the exact same storm.  And I wondered what they would do in this case and with a very heavy heart I took stock of my choices and decided to move the tent.  By myself.  With all of my stuff in the tent.  Thankfully the spotlight was on the tent, I wouldn’t have to hold a flashlight and do this.

I dragged, pulled and cajoled the tent into moving across the wet grass.  It took forever.  At one point I took hold of the corner, pulled and got the tent to move and we were booting across the lawn and the thing i was holding onto ripped off and i went flying backward through the air, landing flat on my back.  I laid there absorbing the pain, staring at the sky and wondered if I could just lay there for a while until i was rested.

But, up I got,  I got the tent behind a super large pine tree that was planted in honour of a now-deceased congregant - thanked her for being there - and found the wind had diminished in that spot, like I hoped it would have.  I Pegged out the tent, cut down the small tarp from the line, threw it over the tent, pegged it down.  Added supports to the poles.  Made it as good as I could.  I cut down the big tarp and carried that to the back door of the church and stuffed it out of the way.  Took my visiting chairs and stashed them inside too so they wouldn’t blow away.

And so back into the tent I went, dried off the best i could, found the still warm brick in the sleeping bag and tried to fall asleep.

And woke up to find the tent had SHIFTED AGAIN!!!!!  Even with the reduced wind, the tent went over on a different side, but collapsed it was.  Got up, found some rope in the tent, went outside and tied the tent to the tree, apologizing and hoping for the families forgiveness as i wrapped my rope around its branches.

Climbed back into the tent, dried off again and crawled back into bed, the brick no longer as warm, but still a comfort.  After time, I fell asleep, and when the alarm went off, I realized I had survived.  By the grace of God and the strength of a mighty pine tree, I slept for about five hours.

That’s enough sleep to get through the day isn’t it?

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