Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

We are Jemima and Easter Yeggs.  Lieutenant Yeggs wants his son to write these reports to keep in touch when we are out having our adventures, and Rev C.S.L., my Dad, doesn’t mind an update either.

The storm was approaching.  We were on the second floor of a hotel that has five floors.  We had accessible balconies.  Easy and I had the room on the west of the three rooms facing the Gulf of Mexico.  Ellie, Ben and Michael had the center room, really a double room with an extra bedroom, and Mary and Joseph had the eastern corner, all three facing the storm.  Dr. Ellie had gambled when the storm was not making it clear where it would go, and it looks like landfall will be to our southwest.  Unless the eye wall moves outward, we will miss any part of the eye, so it is “endure the storm” until it passes for our team.  But it puts us on the stronger side of the storm, in the path of the highest storm surge.  But it looks like the tide will be going out as the storm comes in.  We are expecting the water to get to the top of the seawall and no further.

The parking garage was at the far end of the hotel.  It was further from the beach and elevated.  Easy had set up, and strapped down, every instrument he could.  He calculated the height of the instrumentation to be about 26 feet above the normal level of the Gulf.  The seawall was seven feet.  The rise to the parking garage was another three feet and then being on the second floor of the garage was sixteen feet up.  His instruments were roughly the same height as everything we had on the balconies.  But since he was outside in the Turtle, I was staying with Ellie, Ben, and Michael.  He should be returning any minute, but he said something about rigging a safety line from the hotel to the parking garage, with the hotel’s approval.  I just doubted that after Easy got back to the building, we would have nobody venturing out of the hotel.

Ben and Ellie, being total professionals, were hovering, moving from one computer screen to another.  They were downloading the latest radar information.  The hurricane was still out in the Gulf, but we were getting battered by wind, rain, and the water was rising.

Since Michael was just looking at what his new parents were doing, I said, “Michael, Sweetie, come over here and sit next to me.  I know that you want to learn, but every time you step out of Home Wrecker’s way, you step into Mama’s Man’s way.”

Home Wrecker turned around and laughed, “That’s My Boy!”

If you have not figured it out, “Mama’s Man” had been Mama’s Boy, a.k.a. Home Wrecker’s husband, Dr. Ben Casey.  After all, they could not date each other until Mama allowed it.  Now, Home Wrecker and Mrs. Casey are thick as thieves.  Then, Mama Casey had to allow him to propose.  The ring was his grandmother’s ring.  And where do they live?  In Mama Casey’s house.  But “Mama’s Boy” made Ben Casey look like a child, and he was not a child.  So, “Mama’s Man” is really a mama’s boy that grew up to put on big boy pants, and he doesn’t need Mama to help him.  But Ben Casey can tell his friends that he is “all man and his baby’s mama thinks he is the most studliest stud in the stable, her Man!”  Or something like that.  I think Dr. Kildare, the department head, knows the real meaning of Mama’s Man.

As far as “That’s My Boy!”, well that is the code name for Michael.  If Michael does something great, Home Wrecker says, “That’s My Boy!”  If Michael does something stupid, Home Wrecker moans, “That’s my boy.”  It works either way and having me pull Michael from being underfoot was an intermediate “That’s my boy” that I had not heard before.

He had tried to fluff up my breasts for a pillow once before, and when he landed on the floor with a thud, he got a stern lecture. So that he did not play with my body parts while his parents were watching, he sat beside me on the sofa.  They had moved the sofa so that they could have an area in which to lecture us in a lull if there was one.  After all, everyone except for the professors and Michael were getting college credit and we hoped the data would be instructive for all the meteorology students back in Tracy.

“Mom,” Michael asked. “How high is the water?”

Home Wrecker checked and said, “Three feet high and rising.”

“Dad,” Michael asked. “How high is the water?”

Mama’s Man growled, “Your Mom said, ‘Three feet high and rising.’ We are a bit busy, Michael.“

Michael leaned against my shoulder.  I slipped my hand over and combed Michael’s hair with my fingers, and I said, “How high’s the water, Mama? Three feet high and risin’. How high’s the water, Papa? She said it’s three feet high and risin’. Well, the hives are gone; I’ve lost my bees. The chickens are sleepin’ in the willow trees. Cow’s in water up past her knees. Three feet high and risin’. ”  Singing the last line.

Michael asked, “Mama, are there really chickens in the willer trees?”

Home Wrecker stopped and stared at the far wall.  “Why would you think that, Michael?  And when you ask again, it is a willow tree, not a willer tree.”

Michael said, “But that’s what I thought Aunt Jemima said.  I’m sorry.”

Home Wrecker gave him a concerned look, “Aunt Jemima?”

Michael raised his head from my shoulder and nodded, “Yeah, she doesn’t like me calling her Stinker.  It doesn’t sound very respectful.  And her name is Jemima, and she has a nephew and a niece that are older than she is.  So, Aunt Jemima is my code name for her.”

Home Wrecker snickered, “That’s my boy!  Already making his own code names.”

Mama’s Man said, “Stinker, you may need to go to your room.  One of your instruments just went off line.  Oh, never mind.  It’s back up and running.  Easy must be back in the room.”

I was about to hit the speed dial, but my phone rang.  I answered, “Hello, Sweetie, I said I would be with our professors, why don’t you come over?  They have the door ajar so you don’t need to even knock.”

Easy came in and looked at us on the sofa.  He gave a questioning look while I still stroked Michael’s hair.  He finally said, “Hey, my turn to cuddle.”  He sat down on my other side, and leaned over and kissed me.

Home Wrecker huffed, “No cuddling.  You need to report.”

“Really?  You are getting the data, you ought to know what I did.” Easy groaned.

Home Wrecker asked, “Why did you not come straight here?  You knew where Stinker would be.”

Easy shrugged, “You see that I am wearing comfortable clothing.  If you want to go to our room, you will find my Turtle uniform in the shower’s towel rack.  It is drenched, but yes, I installed a safety line from the hotel to the garage.  There is about ten feet where if you aren’t tied off, you might get blown away.  I brought all our lanyards in, and I have them in our room.  Anything else?  Oh, since I have been away from the computer screens, how high is the water?”

Michael said, “How high’s the water, Mama?”

Home Wrecker groaned, “Four feet high and rising.”

Michael asked, “How high’s the water, Papa?”

Mama’s Man was a little calmer than before, “She said, ‘four feet high and rising.”

I added, “Hey, come look through the window pane. The bus is comin’, gonna take us to the train. Looks like we’ll be blessed with a little more rain. Four feet high and risin’.”  Singing the last line.

Home Wrecker huffed, “Stinker, you know what Michael has been through this year.  Why are you singing a song about a family that gets washed out in a flood?  You are going to traumatize him, and we are stuck on an island in a hurricane.”

I looked at Michael, “Michael, are you traumatized?”

Michael snickered, “Nope, I’m enjoying the game.”

I added, “And if you think this through, who are the people in the song?”

Michael shrugged, “Somebody’s singing it and there is his Mama and his Papa.  Or her, since you have been singing.”

I said, “The song was written by Johnny Cash, and he tells the story about how his parent’s farm was flooded when a flood broke through a levee in Arkansas when he was a kid.  So, what happened to the Cash family?”

Michael said, “I don’t know.  You never finished the song.”

I laughed, “It only has one more verse and it ends with ‘five feet high and risin’.’  But think, Michael.  It was a story about Johnny Cash’s childhood, and he sang the song as an adult.”

Michael said, “Well, he must have survived.  I am guessing his parents did too, or you wouldn’t be singing it.”

“Good,” I replied. “So, how high is the seawall?”

Michael said, “Seven feet.  So, we start flooding in another three feet.  And Mom said that we were not going to get as much storm surge as they predicted.”

Home Wrecker corrected him. “No, I said that we would be getting close to low tide when the peak of the storm surge hit.  That would make the water about half a foot lower than high tide.”

Dr. Ben said, “Michael, jump up and look out the window here.  See when a wave hits the seawall.  The water shoots way up into the air and then the water splashes all over the road and drains into the storm drains on this side of the road.”

Michael nodded, “Does that mean we are starting to flood?”

Dr. Ben chuckled, “That’s why I had you come over.  If we get water above the seawall, you won’t see that splash.  Maybe a little ripple, but now, the waves hit the wall and they have nowhere to go so they splash up.  Then the wind blows them in our direction.  We have a little less than three feet of seawall left and the ground floor of the hotel is another three feet up, and we may or may not get to the point where you do not see that splash.  I did not want you worrying about the splash and the spray.  And, even if the splash is gone, we still have three more feet before it reaches the floor beneath us.  We may lose power, but we will be safe.  Got it?”

Michael nodded, “Yes, sir.”

At that moment, the door opened and B.B. and No Joe burst into the room.  They were both soaked to the bone.

“What happened to you two?” Home Wrecker ejaculated.

Joseph asked, “I’m the rookie.  Do you want me to take the blame?”

B.B. groaned, “No, my OCD kicked in.  One of our instruments was crooked, and won’t give us the best data.  I unlocked the door and started to slide it open.  It took both Joseph and I to close it.  And our bed linens are soaked.  I guess we can go to the front desk and ask for replacement sheets.  We think the mattress is fine.”

Dr. Ben huffed, “You are a graduate meteorologist.  What danger does that opened door cause, B.B.?”

Mary started to cry.  There may have been tears, but she was so wet, it was hard to tell.  “The storm is then introduced inside the structure.  The pressure could have lifted the door frame and the entire door could have fallen into us as we were closing it.  Since we are on the corner, the pressure could push the outside wall outward, like a slow explosion in the room.”

Dr. Ben asked, “Then, in risking your lives and the structural integrity of this building, was the data worth it?”

She shook her head.

Home Wrecker said, “But we have a different problem.  Where do they sleep?  Michael is in our spare bedroom, so that we can take a look at the storm and keep an eye on the data.  I have a bathrobe, but I do not have appropriate night attire for guests.  All I have are the Gwen Quinn specialties.”

B.B. said, “I don’t have the bathrobe.  It was supposed to be just honeymoon attire outside our work and travel clothing.”

Home Wrecker said, “Well, we do have the sofa.  It is a foldout bed.  We can spin it around to give you some privacy.”

I suggested, “To avoid a storm chasing orgy in here.  Michael can have a sleepover in our room.  We have two queens instead of the kings that all the other rooms have in this part of the hotel.”

Michael brightened, “Mom, that sounds great!  Aunt Jemima can teach me the rest of the song.”

Home Wrecker shook her head, but she agreed.  Things were getting out of control quickly, and the storm had not landed yet.

Then she looked toward heaven, “Please, Lord, the last time we were in a hurricane, there was a knock at the door and a pregnant woman came in and dropped a baby in our laps.  At least after B.B. reached inside and turned it around.  Please, Lord, not again!”

And everyone said, “Amen!”

Home Wrecker said, “Before the slumber party folks leave, what about a power loss?”

Easy said, “I checked with the hotel manager.  They have a generator, but it does not include the rooms.  I have the generator on the Turtle running.  We will have about ten hours of power there, and it’s a separate fuel tank from the Turtle itself, but then each instrument has about four hours of power on each battery.  If there is any storm left, it might be the outer bands on the backside.”

I added, “The cameras here and in the Turtle only have about two hours of power on their batteries, but everything inside is on an uninterruptible power supply, which gives us about eight hours more power, depending on what things are powered by each UPS.”

B.B. added, “But there is one problem, in the switching, the WiFi might go down and we might need a reboot.  The cameras each have to be turned on after an outage and they are power hogs compared to the instruments.  And a power outage would be great theater for our reality television show.”

Michael giggled, “Remember that movie where everybody had a flashlight in their faces, and they were scared out of their wits?”

I asked, “Your parents let you watch that?”

Michael laughed, “No, but I saw the trailer.”

B.B. said, “Let’s do it.  Flashlights and cellphones unless we use a handheld video camera.  May be poor quality, but that might add to the excitement.  We can let the lawyers argue over copyright or anything like that.”

Home Wrecker groaned, “No, people!  Stairwells have these emergency lights that only stay on 90 minutes.  Stairwells get awfully dark.  Protocol is to evacuate, but under hurricane conditions, we stay in place.  Got it?!”

Then Ben added, “As long as right here is safe.  Let’s keep in touch until this hurricane passes.”

As the three of us got up from the sofa and headed for our room, Michael asked, “Aunt Jemima, we are having a sleepover together, but where is Easy going to sleep?”

Easy sputtered, “Wha..  What?  Wait!”

I hugged Michael, “You sleep in the spare bed.  Easy and I sleep together.”

Easy groaned, “The two newlywed couples get to have privacy and a little fun, while we babysit.”

I suggested, “We could have a shower together.  I scratch your back.  You scratch mine?”

B.B. groaned, “Oh, brother!”

Michael asked, “What does that mean?”

Home Wrecker said, “I’ll explain that when you are older, much older, like 40.”

Michael smiled, “Don’t worry, Mom.  I think I figured it out.”

Home Wrecker said, “That’s my boy, and boy, are we in trouble!”

We put Michael in front of the laptop screen.  Since we had taught him what computer programs did what things, he started opening windows to track the hurricane, check local radar, and see what NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association), NHC (National Hurricane Center) and the NWS (National Weather Service) were reporting.  At this point, it was more curiosity than panic.  Since both of his adoptive parents were meteorologists, weather was a daily diet for him, but somewhere in my mind, I thought of how just a few short months ago he was floating down the river and his parents had drowned.

Easy and I took our shower and did some back scratching.  Between me not feeling well and Easy driving through the night to get to the Houston area, storm chasing, and setting up instruments while I set up cameras, we had not had any young married couple time.  But before I was finished with my hair (preparing for a prolonged power outage – just in case), there was a knock at the bathroom door.

“Aunt Jemima, you need to see this.” Michael said urgently.

“I am nearly done washing my hair.  Can Easy do it?” I queried.

“Yeah,” he said, sounding quite dejected.

Easy was already dressed, in pink coveralls since his Turtle suit was still wet. “What have you got?  A new weather report?”

“No,” Michael pointed.  “There’s a bird on the balcony.”

Easy asked, “A seagull?”

Michael shrugged, “It just looks like a ball of feathers with a long beak.  I don’t know one bird from another one.”

Easy looked out the window.  “Yeah, we need to have Stinker turn the video camera that is on the swivel.  You have made a very interesting discovery.  I hope the bird is not injured.  See that wire?  Some researchers are tracking the migration patterns of this type of bird.  I have read reports that the birds will not change their migration patterns.  They will fly right into the hurricane or tropical storm.  They will surf the winds of the storm until their instinct tells them they are on the far side of the storm, but sometimes they get into the circular pattern of the winds long enough to become exhausted, and they come down to wait out the storm and then continue on.  Keeping a video eye on this little fellow might be very educational.  My cousin Poached is married to an ornithologist, Callie.  She does research in the Everglades.  I think their baby, Scarlet Ibis Yeggs, is going to stay at Lily the Pink for about six weeks sometime near Christmas this year while Poached and Callie go to the research mangrove.  I think Callie will get excited about your find.  Now we need to put your Aunt Jemima to work.”

I came out of the bathroom about the time he mentioned my name.  I congratulated Michael regarding his find, and I remotely adjusted the video camera to focus on the bird.  When the winds eventually died down, shifting to winds from the west, then the bird outstretched his wings, and was gone.

But before the bird flew away, the entire concept of a sleepover was gone.  As the storm surge reached its peak, it went over the top of the seawall.  No longer could you see the splash and spray.  The first floor of the hotel never flooded, but when Michael saw the water above the seawall, he started to cry.  We didn’t have a sofa, like the Caseys had in their room.  I sat next to him on the edge of his bed, and I gave him a side hug.  For a couple of hours, he talked about his birth parents, and how he missed them.  He talked about his goats, and how he missed them.  He talked about being scared that he would lose his new family.  But after a couple of hours, he was talked out.  He drifted off to sleep.  As a result, I hardly noticed when Easy said that we had two official landfalls.  The first was on Freeport Island at Quintana, Texas.  The second was on the mainland at Brazosport, Texas.  We missed the eye, but we still got about eight feet of storm surge.  We reached hurricane strength, but it was not as big of a storm as anticipated.  There was less rapid intensification.  Further down the coast, there was massive damage, and the roads were so badly damaged, we decided to skip a tour of the storm damage.

The waters quickly subsided, and we were able to head home.  Along the way, we saw the makings of a tornado or two.  We decided to do a little storm chasing.

As Easy tried to match the speed of a small tornado, I felt something I had never felt before, the baby’s first kick.  I yelped, and Easy asked what was wrong.  I told him that it was the time for an experienced mother to feel the baby kicking, but since this was the first time for me to be pregnant, it should be a lot later.

But I felt it.  Then, the baby kicked again and again.

Something inside me went into a dark place.  I said, “Easy, the baby doesn’t like all this excitement.  The baby cannot see where you are going.  What if the baby does not want me to go storm chasing.  What if the baby cries anytime I leave the house.  What if …”

Easy said, “Stop the what ifs.  You know what they say, ‘If ifs and buts were coconuts…’”

I stared at him, but he had one eye on the tornado and one eye on the road. “Okay, wise guy, finish the saying!  Don’t try to calm me down from the ledge and leave me hanging.  I am looking at maybe being on my last storm chase, and all you can do is give me half an old saying!”

Home Wrecker said, “In my old drinking days … and Michael, do not have any old drinking days.  Promise me that. …  Anyway, I heard it as: If ifs and buts were coconuts … we’d have a whole lot of piña coladas.”

B.B. suggested, “If ifs and buts were coconuts … we’d have a lot of macaroons.”

Joseph suggested, “I had an Indonesian friend who made delicious pancakes with coconut.  If ifs and buts were coconuts … we’d have a lot of wingko.”

Michael suggested, “I’m not old enough to know old sayings, but I think it should be: If ifs and buts were coconuts … we’d have a lot of Almond Joys.”

Home Wrecker said, “Mama’s Man, add Almond Joys to our shopping list when we get home.”

Easy raised his voice, “Guys, Guys, Guys!  We have a tornado at nine o’clock, and it’s turning.  Can we get back on task?”

Home Wrecker said, “To the nearest safe turn off.  Go into Turtle mode.”

Easy parked and told me, “Now!”  I deployed the anchors and shields.  The tornado, maybe only an EF0 crossed the road in front of us.  Easy could have outrun it or performed a high-speed turn and gone down a country road, but …  we had a baby onboard.  But I learned something with my mini-meltdown.  Whether I ever go storm chasing again or not, I have the greatest bunch of friends that anyone could have.  Goofy, but great friends.

And to both Dads, we may be home before you read this report, and it is a little long, but there is a lot of love in the Turtle.

Credits

Five Feet High and Risin’ was written by Johnny Cash.  The first verse, not mentioned in the story above, talks about the crops being gone.  The second verse talks about the livestock being gone or about to be.  The last two verses talk about how the humans need to get out also.  Like in the story of the flood that left Michael Rowe without parents, I made a safety plea.  Here, the plea is that when there is an evacuation order, do not try to be a hero.  The hero is the person who leads the family to safety.

I never saw the Blair Witch Project either, but I have seen the trailer.  Having meteorologists reporting the weather by cellphone video and a flashlight might be … ummm … interesting.

During hurricane Irene in 2011, a little whimbrel with a tracking signal on its back flew through the hurricane.  He had to stop in the Bahamas, but he eventually made it from Canada to Brazil.

And this entire story was written before Hurricane Beryl was taking the same track, roughly, as the unnamed hurricane in this story.  I prayed for safekeeping of all in its path.  I do not mean any disrespect to anyone who has had loss from such storms.  In fact, more discussion can lead to better building codes and what Jemima said – evacuate when the order is given.

And we owe a great deal to the professional storm chasers, in the data that they collect, but I have known friends that were thrill seekers and went to such hotels in the storm path.  At least they survived to tell the tale, “I will never do that again!”