1979: The year started out with confusing news to a kid my age. What the heck is inflation? Why can’t we get more gas? Who keeps raising the price and can’t someone tell them to stop it? So much of what my parents assumed I was ignoring on the news each day was very confusing to me. Mom was more of a creative type that despite her assertions to the contrary, was the one that always seemed unaffected by negativity in the world. Where panic was depicted on the TV screen, Mom carried out her daily duties with a smile on her face. By this time she had gotten a job at Perkin’s Department Store in the only mall in the town of just over 100,000 people. Sikes Center. (They now spell it Sikes ‘Senter’, but that’s just stupid!) The job was just to make a little money so she could pursue her real passion and natural aptitude – painting. 
1979 was just as confusing as 1978 had been to me. So much of the grown-up world with which I was surrounded seemed to make no sense at all. Three Mile Island was something that made a lot of news, but I couldn’t understand what radiation was. All I knew was that there had been an accident at a place with the word “nuclear” in it’s title. The little bit that I knew of nuclear technology led me to believe that “nuclear” meant “wiping out the planet.” I had no idea there were positive uses. President Carter continued to make my father crazy and I’ll admit that even I felt a little uneasy with that man being in charge of our country. I had no grounds to make such a statement on my own, but somehow in my little brain, he was responsible for everything that was going on in the world. 
April 10, 1979 – It was a nice afternoon in Wichita Falls. Mom was in Dallas, painting with the aforementioned Mr. Vail, so Ryan and I were enjoying a rare afternoon with Dad. Our Grandparents were coming into town the next day, so Dad decided he was going to run to the bakery just up the street and get some of the cinnamon raisin bread that Grandbob (Dad’s father. Bob Giles = Grandbob) loved so much. There had been intermittent interruptions all afternoon long as Ryan and I tried to watch Popeye on TV. Apparently, one of those intense storms that frequently pop up in that part of the world was heading our way. Again, Dad didn’t seem too worried, so neither were we. Tornadoes had hit in several towns around Wichita Falls earlier that day, so we figured the worst we would get would be rain, maybe some hail, and wind. Besides, we had TV Dinners to eat, and cartoons to watch. Dad had not been gone all that long when the skies literally closed above Wichita Falls. It went from a calm, spring afternoon to an eerie, greenish hue in a matter of seconds. Then the Tornado Sirens began blaring. In Texas, as well as other parts of the Midwest, tornado safety is taught in schools and it is not taken lightly. I didn’t think anything of the acts I performed when I heard the sirens. It was as natural as breathing and required no thought. There was no fear…… yet. I scampered down the hallway as soon as a commercial break allowed. With 4 year old Ryan in tow we grabbed the mattress off of my bed and pulled it out into the hallway, leaned it up against the wall just as we had been told to do, and hid underneath it’s protective cover. The end of our makeshift fort was open, and provided a clear view of the TV in the den. Still, there was no fear. There was no panic. Not yet. The hail started falling first. I sneaked out from under the mattress, much to Ryan’s chagrin, and took a peak out the sliding glass doors down the hallway.
The sky was black. Not black like it is at night, but black like it would be if someone threw a thin blanket over the sun. There was a grayish luminescence letting me know that this was not the calm afternoon I had been enjoying just a few hours prior. The trees outside were bowing to the incoming force in such a manner that their leaves were all turned over, exposing their lighter colored bellies and completely altering the appearance I had come to expect from that vantage point. I remember watching a large bird struggling against the powerful wind and wondering why it didn’t just land and protect itself. Their was debris flying everywhere. Suddenly, the bird was gone. The wind was blowing so forcefully that I couldn’t see what it was that hit the bird, but whatever it was it was big, and it ended that poor bird’s flight immediately.
As suddenly as it had all started, it stopped. All the debris that was flying around in the air outside dropped as if someone had just turned off a giant magnet in the sky. Literally, stuff just dropped from the sky and calm was restored. The wind stopped. The hail stopped. The sirens stopped. The only thing that made this day seem different from any other afternoon was the fact that every hair on the back of my neck could be felt standing at military attention. There were goosebumps up and down my flesh, yet I was not cold. That’s when panic set in. This was not the kind of calm that people pray for in harrowing situations. This was the kind of calm a dying man Christian feels as he draws his last breath. I hurried back into the safety of that mattress as all hell broke loose.
The sounds that we heard will never be forgotten. I hugged Ryan close as what sounded like a fleet of locomotives hovered over our heads. The electricity went out and Ryan began to cry. He was only 3 at the time, almost 4, but he was terrified. Rarely does a little brother admit that he’s relying on big brother for anything but that was the first time I ever felt like Ryan’s protector. It was the first time I ever felt like it was as much my responsibility to save Ryan from harm as it was my parents’. Speaking of which, as the glass windows around the house began to shatter, and noises I hope I never hear again began to fill my head, Dad came bursting through the front door. I wasn’t sure at first that it was him. I hoped it was, but it was just as likely that it was the front of our house being removed by angry skies. Dad ran immediately into his own bedroom and came back out with the king sized mattress from their bed. He had two strangers with him that he had apparently pulled into safety. To this day, I still have no idea who those people were, but I know that they survived something they wouldn’t have if it hadn’t been for my father’s bravery and generosity. We huddled together, pulling each other close under that mattress. I was so relieved to have Dad home. Not because I was afraid he would get hurt out there on his own, but because now that he was there I was free to be a terrified six year old kid. I cried with Ryan as if I had been holding it in for more years than I had lived. The sounds of utter destruction could be heard all around us. It wasn’t like in the movies. There were no distant screams from unfamiliar throats. These were horrific sounds. The sounds of brick, wood, and metal being ripped apart by an unstoppable force. These were the sounds of people we knew losing everything they had. These were the sounds of my comfortable little neighborhood, which quite frankly was my whole world, being permanently altered.
Then, just as quickly as it all started, it stopped. The sounds of destruction and mayhem could still be heard but they were somehow distant. They were now filling the ears and minds of people in distant neighborhoods. People we didn’t know and were powerless to help. Our small, huddled group of terrified souls cautiously emerged from our cover, unsure of what we would find. I had been so deeply buried in my Dad’s comforting chest that I didn’t even know if there was a house above that mattress. The calm was just as eerie as it had been before the storm hit. Was another one coming? Was the house about to collapse? Was Mom still in Dallas and if so, did she have any idea what had just happened? There’s not a man alive that wouldn’t like to say they could get through something like that without being scared but they’d be lying. You don’t come out of something like “Terrible Tuesday” without a few life altering memories.
I can remember as if it happened a few seconds ago the feeling I felt when Dad finally let me and Ryan emerge from our heavily damaged home. The strangers that had survived the storm with us were already gone, no doubt on their way to what was hopefully a standing home of their own but chances are good that was just wishful thinking. The look on Dad’s face said it all. There was nothing he could do to hide the damage from us. There was no soft edge he could put on the story. The complete devastation was all around us. The house across Fairway from us was completely gone. Even the pipes had been ripped from the cement foundation. The silence of confusion was the only sound to be heard. The destruction was so widespread that emergency response teams were not even sure where to mobilize first; their sirens were noticeably absent. With each passing second, the sounds of life after disaster started to hit my ears. First came the sounds of animals. Birds chirping, dogs barking, cats being useless. (I’m not a fan of cats. Their eyes are like staring into the pits of hell but that’s just my opinion. If you own a cat, don’t get all offended. Save your energy for when you have to constantly escape Satan’s grip in your rather warm afterlife.) Next, the sounds of first responders heading out into the carnage. The storm itself could still be seen in the distance, but it was as if it were now happening to someone else. It was like watching a movie. Trees and debris filled the streets. Power lines were everywhere but with no electricity running through them, their danger at the moment was limited.
Mom eventually made it home that evening. I can’t imagine the level of helplessness she must have been feeling as she pulled into town and started to see the destruction. The fear she must have felt. There were no cell-phones in those days. There was no way for her to know, until she got home and could put her hands on each of us, that her young family had survived. In fact; I’m quite certain there had to have been a few moments where she assumed the exact opposite to be true.
That’s enough for today. Kind of a painful research exercise. Lots of memories from a day I go back to every time I hear a storm is coming. People ask why I’m so fascinated with storms to this day; why I stand out in the open, watching as dark clouds begin circling. Gazing skyward with the defiant fascination and stubborn fury of Lieutenant Dan.
to be continued……