Tornado Season is All Year Round

Where I come from, Tornado Alley was anywhere west of Chantilly St and east of Jeff Byrd Road. It wasn’t anything to get worked up about: just bring the trash cans in, or you’d have a mess in the morning trying to crank your generator. Quit your bellyaching — you weren’t going to eat all that frozen chicken anyway.

I remember my dad dropping me off at my girlfriend’s house the afternoon of Hurricane Katrina. Little black birds clutching the power lines on 16th Avenue felt like a sign of the times, but my father explained, “All these people stocking up on canned foods were just too embarrassed to admit they called off their diet. There ain’t nothing to worry about!” He dropped me off with a little money for Chinese takeout and a promise he’d be back before bedtime.

I’ll never forget my girlfriend’s mom clutching her loveseat in her living room, calling down the Lord on high. The lightning cracking filled her dark house, and she sparked like Pikachu.

“KATRINA! I command you! Spare this house! In Jesus’s name!”

She was screaming in tongues at her ceiling while I nibbled at my Orange Chicken — dinner and a show. This lasted long into the night. I thought we were never going to get to sleep. But alas, I woke up the next morning on the floor covered in fried rice, using a King James Version as a pillow.