No words can truly describe what happened a year ago today. This video shows more than enough, but I will share my personal story later on. In 3 1/2 hours our campus will be remembering and reflecting what God allowed us to experience as a body of Christ to further His Kingdom, and we thank Him for that.
All three of these videos portray the same damage but from completely different points of view. Please continue to pray for our campus as we are still healing and pressing onward. It is so easy to forget what happened, but I hope to never forget and never take for granted the protection that was over my life. So often I just say I was in the right place at the right time, and I try to take the credit away from our Heavenly Father, but He alone deserves everything.
MY STORY
A year ago today was just another day. It was actually a very unexpected day as it was the very beginning of February, and I was able to wear shorts, a short sleeved sweater and flip-flops to class. I went to my classes just like any other day, and that evening around 4 I headed to my hostessing job at the Rafferty's of Jackson. The forecast called for storms and harsh weather, but I did not think a thing of it. I was excited to be able to get off work early (about 3 HOURS earlier than normal) so I was happy to invite my boyfriend of almost 4 months, Alex to come eat with me before he had to work on a project in Jennings hall. As we were eating, one of the waiters, Scott, came and told us that we would have to move to a table closer to the center of the restaurant because we couldn't be near any windows. We were finished with our meal and just talking so we obliged and moved in. There were only a few customers in the restaurant: a few regular's at the bar and two women in the booth diagonal from us. We had only been sitting in our booth for maybe three minutes when my manager Nick ordered everybody into the walk-in freezer. I hadn't heard the sirens, but the freezer was supposedly the safest place in the whole restaurant, so we all crammed in there to wait out the storm. Hmm... my experience in the freezer was quite entertaining. The two ladies eating diagonally from us were more than claustrophobic. We had to corner one of them in the back for fear of her running out to her car and heading out straight into the storm. She kept screaming and jumping up and down, and we could not help but laugh. Two other guys were completely wasted. They kept asking if they could have more drinks and provided some very comic relief to the situation that was at hand. I called my mom just to let her know I was okay, and I texted my roommates to make sure they were okay. Everything seemed fine. After the sirens subsided, Alex & I headed out together (i was too afraid to drive by myself), and he was going to drop me off at my dorm and then take me to my car the next morning during my break. That's when we saw the "damage." To put it, damage cannot even describe what we saw. It was very dark, but as we passed the bank to go back to Union we saw one thing, the banks on both sides of the street were gone. Powerlines were down on both sides of the road, and there was a block to Union's campus. Nobody was allowed on campus. The traffic was so terrible that we just headed to Alex's apartment to get Otis (I got Colby a month later) and fins shelter someplace safer. We had heard that more tornadoes were coming so we needed to get someplace else because his apartment was on the second story. I changed quickly into some of Alex's clothes, and all four of us (Alex, Clayton, Otis and I) headed over to Sarah Davenport's (a professor in the Athletic Department) apartment. All the phone lines were down, so it was really hard to receive incoming calls or make outgoing calls. I talked to my parents briefly, told them where I was, and then my phone died. Alex's died as well. We stayed up by the light of the candles playing a board game. I soon was tired of that, and fell asleep by myself in the middle of her hallway. We had no electricity or television access so it was really hard to know what had occurred the night before. Rumors flew. We heard that the ZTA house had it's roof ripped off and that there were people trapped underneath the rubble at Union. We all woke up the next morning, and there was still no electricity. I convinced Alex to try to fight all the traffic so I could check on my dorm and make sure it was okay. I was so worried about the diamond necklace that he had bought me for Christmas. I realized how much value I kept on such trivial things. I was worried about my necklace, my laptop, and my new pottery barn comforter of all things. How shallow. I didn't realize though that I had insurance so I just figured that if I lost everything then I would just be so out of luck. As we pulled up to Union, there were classmates and parents and teachers all around. Nobody was allowed on campus due to the down power lines, etc. Later the next day we were finally able to go on campus. We were told which sorority house to go to, and they gave us each a big black trashbag, a supervising adult and 5 whole minutes to throw in everything we would need for the next month. School was canceled until further notice, and I had 5 minutes to pack up and get out of there. I took the essentials (clothing, pillow, laptop) and left as quickly as I had come. My dorm was completely fine. It was one of the very few buildings in McAfee that had barely any damage. The picnic table that we had spent so much time at that was outside our room had flown through our window. But other than that, my room was completely fine. And thanks to the fact that I had been at work, my car was completely fine. There were less than 100 cars the day after the tornado that weren't totaled. If mine had been on campus it surely wuold have been destroyed. I felt so guilty that I hadn't lost any of my stuff. Everyone was so emotional and upset that it felt wrong to be happy that my belongings were safe and sound. After I got home to Louisville, I went into a slump for a few days. I went to Whitefield's homecoming where I was welcomed by everyone I knew. I received countless facebook messages from friends and family saying that they were praying for me. I felt like I didn't deserve the prayer and support because I felt like I had experienced nothing. I didn't have a cool story to tell. I didn't even get a brand new car like almost everyone else seemed to have once school started back. Sometimes I wish I had lost everything, but now I am grateful that I was spared. It was such a miracle that nobody was killed that night. Over fifty people were sent to the hospital, and three of them remained there for quite some time. We ended up having different schedules and that was pretty crazy, but overall, Union handled the situation very well. By the fall of 2008, all the new dorms were up and running. The 10 year building project that was in place got reduced to the 7 month project. We have healed significantly from that tradgedy, but we are still scared sometime. I remember the first time there was bad weather after that night, I had a bag packed and ready to take with me. Of course nothing happened, but I was prepared. All of us students know what to do now. We have first floor bathrooms with about 4 locks on them and they are tornado "proof." They still would not be able to withstand an EF-4 tornado, but we hope that night was the exception. We have drills and plans set in place and everyone knows exactly what to do just in case. So many times I credit myself. I was in the right place at the right time. But God is truly the one who spared my life that February night. He saved all of our lives, and I hope to not soon forget. Union University was not victim that night; we were blessed to be able to direct the glory of everything that happened to us to our Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ. Union was United. 02-05-08
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