I'm sitting in a shaded outdoor patio of a Starbucks in downtown Tempe, AZ. The temperature is perfect and there is a light breeze. There are a lot of people around me slowly enjoying a Saturday morning coffee while marathon walkers quietly go past. I've had several "congrats" and offers to buy me a coffee as strangers notice my growing stomach. It is a beautiful and calm morning. And it makes everything that happened yesterday seem so unreal.
Yesterday was the day that I left Wichita Falls, TX to go see family for the next 3 weeks while Peter is finishing up the first training school. My friend, Josie, picked me up to take me to my first OB appointment in TX. It was very long and thorough, 2 hours to be exact. But it was great. I even found out what position the baby was in and heard their little hiccups as the nurse checked for the heart beat. Afterward we went back to my house, loaded my luggage in the car, picked up another friend and headed for the airport and shopping in Dallas - a good 2.5 hours away.
After making a couple wrong turns in the construction traffic and finding out there were 2 airports in Dallas and that we were heading for the wrong one, Josie got a call that her neighborhood had been evacuated due to wildfires. The fence in her back yard didn't exist anymore and the news was calling Wichita Falls a disaster area. Thirty minutes later another call said that the training area on the base had been evacuated as well. And then, as I was getting out at the correct airport with little time to spare, another call saying that base housing was now being evacuated. I debated if I should just cancel the trip and go home with my friends to face this disaster, not knowing what I could do or where people were being evacuated to. Josie told me to just go and leaving would also meet the goal of evacuating. It was with a very strange, surreal feeling that I stood in line to check in.
After going through security though, I received another call that my dear, old Gran had fallen down the basement steps and was still in x-rays after being rushed to the hospital. My mom was very upset as she waited on the results and fearing what could-be. There was nothing for me to do at that point but to fly to Phoenix and hear an update there. But before boarding I got another call that base housing was clear and no longer was under evacuation, our homes were "safe" from the fires.
In Phoenix, my brother picked me up from the airport. The news was that my Gran had a few broken ribs, some staples and stitches on her head and face, and bruises and scratches. It will be a long recovery, but she will be okay. Praise the Lord. I will be in Michigan in a few days to see her too. I was able to call and talk to Peter after that and tell him all the un-expected craziness that had happened. It was good to talk, but it seemed so unreal. And unreal to have felt so calm through it all. The Lord's peace is supernatural and transcends understanding. And He is so GOOD.
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