Standing by the Window

Today I was working on my computer in my room on the second floor of the big house where I live, on a project for a friend. We had heavy rain and wind today here in Northern Indiana, and warm temps in the 50's.

Late in the afternoon, the rain stopped and the sun came out for a bit. It was like a lovely spring day, all the snow has melted and the river is running high. I took a walk down to the river and back and when I got home, I began work on the project.

The windows in my room are tall, about 5 feet high, and I get a good view of the neighborhood and all the way over to the college campus. While I was working, I heard a sound like a jet overhead and paused to listen. No, it's a train I thought. But then I realized it was the wind. Bad sign here in tornado country. And, it started pouring rain, sheets of rain. So, I got up and stood by the window to see what I could see.

The trees were bending tremendously and there was a dark line in the clouds. I stood there fascinated by the sound and the trees and the rain and this cloud and then it occured to me, that I was on the second floor, next to a window and a tornado was possibly coming through here! For some reason, I stood there immobilized, knowing that I should run for cover in the basement, 2 floors down, but could not tear myself away from the window. I ran from room to room to try to see if I could see a tornado and then while I was trying to get a glimpse of what could have been my demise, the wind stopped, just like that, and everything became still. Another bad sign.

Better get downstairs now, I thought, and ran down the stairs. One of my roommates said, did you hear that wind? We stood there listening, still not heading down to the basement, but nothing happened. The wind had just stopped and was not picking up again. The rain continued, a nice, even steady rain and I went back upstairs to my room.

I am still puzzled about why I didn't immediately take cover, as I had been taught to do since kindergarten, when such conditions exist. Why I stood there by the window, trying to see if there was a tornado, is beyond me. Some strange fascination with the weather and its power, like standing by the ocean during a big swell, out on a rock, or walking through a blizzard, or walking around through the cracking trees after a big ice storm.

Maybe it is the adrenaline rush or perhaps just a simple reminder of my place in the universe.