I’m standing next to the Hallam Farmer’s Co-op in the near center of town and I have no idea how I got here, I don’t remember walking here but here I stand. The sky is an unusual color. As I look around I realize I’m the only one who is around. I think to myself how odd it is that there is no activity, Hallam is completely still. What is with the sky? It’s not even a blue color; it’s a deep pink without a cloud in it. I turn around and start walking east, heading for home when a wind comes up and I hear a crackling sound. When I turn back around I see a funnel come down out of the sky about a mile away and I panic. It’s not a normal funnel. This funnel is made of fire. Then a second funnel spawns off next to it, this one of dust and regular debris. Then a third funnel spawns off next to the dust funnel but this one is made of water. All three are headed east; in the direction I am heading, in the direction of my house, in the direction opposite I wish it to go, straight for Hallam. I don’t know what happens next because I wake up and I burst into tears of relief, my heart thudding so hard in my chest I think I’m about to have panic attack.

My worst fear has always been experiencing a tornado or some other natural disaster even though I knew it was more likely a tornado would occur. My worst fear occurred and reoccurred in that nightmare I had been having since I was little, preceding the actual one that occurred on Saturday, May 22nd, 2004. I was 10 years old at the time. The nightmare was almost like a precursor for the nightmare of the real life tornado. A precursor to never feeling truly safe and secure ever again but gaining a new value on my relationships with my friends and family, I could have lost them that night, I could have lost my life that night but I didn’t and I learned that I had to get something out of this horrible experience.

Growing up in a town of three-hundred some people I’ve nearly always felt safe and secure, like no harm could ever or would ever come to us. Until tonight I hadn’t realized what an illusion I had been living. I didn’t know any better because up until now I hadn’t experienced anything that would change that belief. I just got home from a friend’s who was having an end of the school year party. Dad came and picked me up this afternoon. Now that we’re home he’s cooking goulash. I run across the street to let my Grandma Ferne’s dog, TD, back into the house for the night and run back across the street to our house, making note of the bluish-green and still sky.

My family and I are sitting down to eat supper when the phone rings with our neighbor, Nancy on the other end of the line. Nancy is frantic and scared. Her husband Phillip and two members of his extended family are out of town, leaving Nancy, her sister, their mother, and three young children at Nancy and Phillip’s home by themselves. Come to find out, they’ve been watching the news. A tornado is headed our direction and they don’t have sufficient shelter for all six of them. So mom invites them over and within two minutes we hear a knock on the front door. I run to the door and open it up, letting Nancy, her mom, and her sister file in, a baby in each of their arms.

We leave supper on the table and the ten of us head to our basement and turn on the television to the news station, confirming what Nancy was saying on the phone is true. At this point I’m not too scared; it’s all kind of surreal. I hear mom reassuring Nancy, telling her, “Nancy, there hasn’t been a tornado come through Hallam in 100 years, there isn’t going to be one tonight. We are all going to be fine.” The power flickers out. I follow dad upstairs to find flashlights and a candle or two so we can see more than what the dim light of dusk offers in through the basement window. We haven’t been back downstairs for even a minute when mom looks out the window and sees the patio furniture twirl up in the air. “Get under the ping pong table, everyone under the ping pong table now!” My mom hollers.

Huddled under the ping pong table praying the Lord’s Prayer I find no peace, no comfort as the tornado rips over us. There’s a loud thud, a noise like a chair being dragged across the floor, glass breaking, and children crying inconsolable tears. An unmistakable feeling resides in the pit of my knotted stomach, the gut wrenching feeling of needing to vomit. The awful taste rises into my mouth and I think I’m really going to puke among everything else going on.

Once the roaring becomes silenced we all head out of the basement, deeming it unsafe because it’s filling with water and the stench of natural gas. We climb debris filled stairs, one at a time. Mom is ahead of me and I see her lift a toilet up and toss it out of the way so there’s a clear path up. We get the babies up and out to the first of us up the stairs then the rest of us follow. I look to my right and see dad’s car, dome lights on and a dinging noise coming from it. ‘That’s an unusual place for the car,’ I think to myself. It could have been blocking our way out to safety. It wasn’t even three feet from the opening of the stairs. We head towards Main Street after being unable to find shelter across the street. We don’t know where we’re going, all we know is the natural gas and water filling basement wasn’t safe for us anymore.
I notice it is pitch black, not a star or cloud in the sky as I look around frantically. I look down and realize I’m standing smack dab in the middle of Main Street and North East atop the manhole cover. I look up again to follow mom, dad, and the rest of the crew and I notice in the distance a thin funnel spiraling its way east. A shiver runs up my spine. I’m terrified and I just want this all to be a dream. A nightmare like the ones I have had before about the three tornadoes. Somehow I know this is real even though it seems so surreal, even though I want it to be just another nightmare I wake up from and not a real-life even in my life.

In the moments of laying on the basement floor, standing on Main Street watching that snake-like funnel spiral its way east, not knowing where we were going to end up, and not knowing if we would all make it out alive is sobering. Even at ten years old, it was a sobering experience. The horror of the night makes me thankful every day for my family. As I followed my family down the road that night the material possessions didn’t matter. I am alive today. My family is alive today and deep down I know they are way more important than any material item ever could be to me. Fear still grips me sometimes. If there’s a bad enough storm a panic goes through me, that night has stayed with me and it affects me even nine years later. I realize that night was a life-changing experience, that I’m lucky to be alive but that safety and security are illusions in this world of what ifs. Safety and security are illusions to those who’ve never experienced a real-life horror story. I ask myself, even today, what safety and security really mean. After surviving a category F4 tornado two and a half miles wide all I know for sure is I’m alive and somehow everything turned out alright. Everything turned out alright even though I didn't feel safe, even though security was ripped away from me that night. No, safety is an illusion to keep me from being scared of something bad happening.