Living in Texas for most of my life, I am used to sudden storms. Tornado warnings, lightening, and flash floods – I take it all in stride. Which is how I got ‘the picture’.
I had taken my children to town in our rural area, and came back home just ahead of what promised to be a big thunderstorm. The skies were black, lightening flashed, and I was just glad to beat the rain so that I could get my groceries in before it hit. I left the door open to the cool breeze as I put things away, when a glance outside caught my attention. This looked worse than I had realized. My children and I gathered on the porch to watch, when I noticed that all the cars on the highway across our pasture had not only stopped, but had pulled over on the side of the road. This really got my attention. We are a very conservative, homeschooling family, and we don’t have a TV, and at that time, we didn’t have a radio that worked most of the time, so I trotted across the pasture, across the highway, and approached a car to see what was going on. A lady informed me that there was a tornado in the little town a mile or so up the road, and no one wanted to drive into it.
Well, that was exciting! I trotted back across the highway and the pasture, only to meet one of my sons halfway, who was running towards me with the telephone. It was my husband. He had stopped on his way home from work to take shelter from the storm in a store, and saw a television update on the tornado. The Doppler radar showed the tornado, and from the looks of it, it was at the creek at the back of our house. Terrified, my husband was calling to make sure we were alright, only to hear from my children that mommy was running across the highway trying to find out what happened. TAKE SHELTER my husband demanded. I ran back to the house.
But it was so fascinating to see the revolving cloud developing across another pasture from us. I thought, just a quick picture, and I ran to get my camera. I ran back outside and aimed. My sweet little daughter, who was always the center of attention and the object of my picture taking, jumped on the swing in front of the camera and waved just as I snapped.
We watched the cloud a little longer, and when it moved directly over our heads, I decided to give my children some instruction on where to get if I yelled for them to take cover, and we went back into the house.
No tornado ever hit us, and I didn’t think of it much again – until I got the pictures back! Have you ever been surprised by the perfect shot you didn’t know you had gotten? There was my little girl, sweet, unafraid smile, waving at mommy, her red sucking thumb very obvious, completely framed by a revolving cloud behind her head. When my husband saw the picture, he shouted “WHAT WERE YOU THINKING!?!?!”
I don’t know, but hey, that is one amazing picture, huh??
A couple of weeks later, another storm approaches. My husband, who no longer trusts me, calls. “Carla,” he says. “There is another tornado warning issued. Do not run across the pasture, do not take pictures. Stay in the house and take shelter!” I laugh.
We get a copy of the picture to hang on the wall. A visiting preacher from another state comes to stay with us, and sees it. He is floored by the perfect, trusting peace on my little girl’s face, with the tornado behind her. He asks for a copy, he wants to hang it, and he quotes scriptures on peace. I gladly give him a copy.
I send copies to my email lists and give them away to friends. Months later, an email friend who lives in Canada tells me she was listening to a preaching tape, and hears the preacher, who does not know us, talk about a picture he has seen of a little girl, smiling, trusting, with a tornado behind her in the background. It’s a picture of ‘perfect peace in the midst of a storm’ he says. “Hey, I know that little girl!” my friend shouts to her tape player!
Perfect peace in a storm, a mothers love, and little girl’s trust. Who’s afraid of a little tornado??
I had taken my children to town in our rural area, and came back home just ahead of what promised to be a big thunderstorm. The skies were black, lightening flashed, and I was just glad to beat the rain so that I could get my groceries in before it hit. I left the door open to the cool breeze as I put things away, when a glance outside caught my attention. This looked worse than I had realized. My children and I gathered on the porch to watch, when I noticed that all the cars on the highway across our pasture had not only stopped, but had pulled over on the side of the road. This really got my attention. We are a very conservative, homeschooling family, and we don’t have a TV, and at that time, we didn’t have a radio that worked most of the time, so I trotted across the pasture, across the highway, and approached a car to see what was going on. A lady informed me that there was a tornado in the little town a mile or so up the road, and no one wanted to drive into it.
Well, that was exciting! I trotted back across the highway and the pasture, only to meet one of my sons halfway, who was running towards me with the telephone. It was my husband. He had stopped on his way home from work to take shelter from the storm in a store, and saw a television update on the tornado. The Doppler radar showed the tornado, and from the looks of it, it was at the creek at the back of our house. Terrified, my husband was calling to make sure we were alright, only to hear from my children that mommy was running across the highway trying to find out what happened. TAKE SHELTER my husband demanded. I ran back to the house.
But it was so fascinating to see the revolving cloud developing across another pasture from us. I thought, just a quick picture, and I ran to get my camera. I ran back outside and aimed. My sweet little daughter, who was always the center of attention and the object of my picture taking, jumped on the swing in front of the camera and waved just as I snapped.
We watched the cloud a little longer, and when it moved directly over our heads, I decided to give my children some instruction on where to get if I yelled for them to take cover, and we went back into the house.
No tornado ever hit us, and I didn’t think of it much again – until I got the pictures back! Have you ever been surprised by the perfect shot you didn’t know you had gotten? There was my little girl, sweet, unafraid smile, waving at mommy, her red sucking thumb very obvious, completely framed by a revolving cloud behind her head. When my husband saw the picture, he shouted “WHAT WERE YOU THINKING!?!?!”
I don’t know, but hey, that is one amazing picture, huh??
A couple of weeks later, another storm approaches. My husband, who no longer trusts me, calls. “Carla,” he says. “There is another tornado warning issued. Do not run across the pasture, do not take pictures. Stay in the house and take shelter!” I laugh.
We get a copy of the picture to hang on the wall. A visiting preacher from another state comes to stay with us, and sees it. He is floored by the perfect, trusting peace on my little girl’s face, with the tornado behind her. He asks for a copy, he wants to hang it, and he quotes scriptures on peace. I gladly give him a copy.
I send copies to my email lists and give them away to friends. Months later, an email friend who lives in Canada tells me she was listening to a preaching tape, and hears the preacher, who does not know us, talk about a picture he has seen of a little girl, smiling, trusting, with a tornado behind her in the background. It’s a picture of ‘perfect peace in the midst of a storm’ he says. “Hey, I know that little girl!” my friend shouts to her tape player!
Perfect peace in a storm, a mothers love, and little girl’s trust. Who’s afraid of a little tornado??
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