Hello, Ike

While the Texans got to see Ike at full blast, we Ohioans were in for a shock yesterday afternoon when 65-80 mph winds started blowing. Ike was here, but we didn't know it then. Brad and I were both upstairs, in separate rooms, when I heard the large, long crackle of wood breaking, and then a large bang that shook the house. I sat in our office in silence, with the words "Did a tree just fall?" going through my mind. Within seconds Brad's voice boomed down the hall, "We lost a tree. Didn't hit a house, but we're blocked in."

A 40-50 ft tree in a tree lawn on the south side of the property had a big, old tree come tumbling down in the wind. It looks like it was decaying from the inside, and the winds snapped it at the base. We were lucky no one was hurt, and that there was no property damage. Yes, we were blocked in since the tree was over our only road out of the development, and there was some landscaping damage, but after hearing other people's stories we were immensely lucky.

After calling a few tree removal companies and getting turned down due to the volume they had already accumulated, we finally found a guy close by to do the job, and for $900. Not bad, considering the high demand. We now have a path clear in our road to drive through, and within the next few days the company will clean up the rest.

My parents, 10 minutes down the road, also got hit hard. Wires down, trees down...complete mess. Neither of us had power, along with over 300,000 residents in the Cleveland/Akron area. What we always find amusing is that typically when we lose power, the houses on the other side of our southern tree lawn typically have it. So we went to a neighbors, had some screwdrivers (and yes, I mean vodka & orange juice) in the driveway, watching the winds and envying the people in the houses that were in their comfortable homes, with their electricity, air conditioning and television. Considering the circumstances, it was not a bad night.

The one thing most people around here agree on is the lack of a warning before the winds came. We certainly knew nothing about it, and we had been watching the Bears/Panthers game on a Cleveland network. I'm not sure what the weather people were up to, but I think they were slacking just a bit. Probably out at the Browns Stadium tailgating and drinking until they felt no pain (in anticipation of their major loss to the Steelers).

What was to happen Sunday evening was our association board meeting, which was going to probably be one big stressful shouting match. Instead, we gathered together as a community (for the most part - a few people decided to play their typical games) and made the best of a bad situation. You can actually say that the tree brought us together, at least for an evening. I'm sure in a week everyone will be back to their political games. But for now I'm going to enjoy the peace while it lasts.