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.

If you have not read the first half of this story, you can use the search feature for “Storms – Part 1”, but there was a hurricane that hit the Florida panhandle.  T.R.U.S.T. had three storm chasing teams.  In the part 1, we are introduced to Wilma, a college student starting her sophomore year, a chatterbox who is just as silly as Arabella, her roommate on their team.  Their team was headed by B.B. and included her husband, Joseph Jones (No Joe), and Easy, Stormie, and me.  We would do no storm chasing with babies on board.  We were just riding out a hurricane and collecting data, and getting reactions of the teammates, especially Wilma, Arabella, and Stormie.  None of them had experienced a hurricane before.  Our team was in Apalachicola, Florida, getting pounded by the worst storm surge and constant winds and rain.

In Panama City, Florida, the Caseys (Dr. Ben, Dr. Ellie, Michael Rowe, and baby Joan) also had another college student starting his sophomore year, Fred.  And in Pensacola, Florida, there was Dr. Kildare, Mags Lothrop, Joseline Johnson with baby Misty, Mike Lothrop, and Mitzi, a student starting her junior year at T.R.U.S.T.

Meanwhile, in Panama City, Florida, Dr. Ben and Fred spent their preparation time setting up instruments, checking WIFI communication, and discussing what would happen if they were in the eye.  This was necessary in that one location to set windspeed instruments would be great for winds from the east, but they might not be so good for winds from the west.  With the suite of hotel rooms having limited balcony space, there was not much choice there, but they drove their SUV to every corner of the elevated parking garage to get the best position.  The electrical instruments would run off a generator and they would have the generator next to the SUV for a little protection.

When all was finished, Michael and Fred got to talk a little about Michael’s storm chasing experience.  Michael talked about losing his parents in a flood and B.B. diving into the raging waters of a swollen river to save his life.  What little he remembered of the next couple of days of riding with the storm chasing team was that he could have never found a more loving group of people.  Then he talked about the honeymoon hurricane adventure.  While his new Mom and Dad were in their room with B.B. and Joseph because B.B. had done something wrong, they sent him to be with Aunt Jemima.  Michael had to explain that Aunt Jemima was Stinker.  And Stinker hugged him and sang to him as the storm surge got higher.  He told Fred that if he got scared, he would go to his parent’s room.  They would probably be looking at the computers or out the windows, and now that he has lived the life of a meteorologist with nightly discussions, he thought he would be okay.  He also told Fred to not expect much sleep until the storm passed.

Michael ended up falling asleep earlier than expected due to being exhausted and Fred could not sleep.  He went into the living room to find Dr. Ellie breast feeding Joan.  Her wrap was in place in case one of the boys came in unexpectedly.

Fred checked the windows and the computer screens.  Then he came over and sat next to Home Wrecker.

He asked, bluntly, “Do you have to be a Christian to be part of the Turtle Team rotation?”

Home Wrecker laughed, and said without thinking, “Don’t worry, if you aren’t, you might soon be.  Give it time, Fred.”

Fred shook his head, “No, I am serious.  The four core teammates are you, Easy, Stinker, and B.B.  Amazon and Kevin have been the backup this past year, along with B.B.’s husband No Joe and your husband Dr. Ben.  All of you talk to each other about your life as a Christian.  The others that have been in the Turtle are a rotation of students that need that credit to graduate.  Mitzi, Wilma, and I have been asked for a return trip, but I think in some ways, we were selected because the others were busy this summer.  When Dr. Kildare, who is also a Christian, makes his selection for part-time replacements, a ‘B’ Team if you will, what is the criteria?”

Home Wrecker stared out the window, as if she had not heard a word.  Maybe she was looking at the approaching storm, but it was as if Fred was not in the room.

Fred asked, “Dr. Casey, have you heard a word that I said?”

Home Wrecker smiled, “Oh, yes, I heard you.  If the talk about our Christianity offends you, you may want to avoid the Turtle Team.  We will talk about it, and we do not apologize.  God commands us to spread the Gospel.  We try to do so in love, and the fun that we have together is because we love one another.  Do you simply want to be on television, Fred?”

Fred shrugged, “No, ma’am.  I want to be that designer of something new that makes a meteorologist’s job easier.  I would love to work closely with Easy, since he has made a lot of modifications to the Turtle. Mitzi is the experimentation person.  I think she is looking at an insurance institute or technical think tank, developing stronger building codes based on experimentation.  The television personality is Wilma, but I don’t think she is trying to have her face on camera as much as she wants the experience so that her audition tapes will be natural.  But if we have to be a Christian to get on the team, it could be that none of us make the cut.”

Home Wrecker smiled, “Fred, if you only knew.  I was in charge of storm chasing when the Turtle was built.  It became the Turtle because its initial driver and his photographer girlfriend thought it looked like a Turtle.  So, when the Turtle made it’s first voyage with me in charge, I wasn’t a Christian.  I had some girl talks with Jemima and without noticing, I had become a Christian.  B.B. was just one of those students needing the credits.  She spent two weeks with the team.  She nearly had a breakdown when we chased our first tornado.  But she snapped out of that.  Then her replacement was murdered on campus and B.B. jumped at the chance for two more weeks.  Before those weeks were done, she not only had accepted Jesus, she went on the first date in her life.  B.B. was a lifelong business driven person, changed by the love of Jesus.  She wanted to experience a date, and Joseph Jones was working as a chaplain for a relief organization.  He would eventually take a leave of absence to chase Mary, forgetting the storms for a while.  My husband had been a Christian for along time, but he rededicated himself when he found out that my Christian conversion was for real.  Fred, if you do not want Jesus in your life, stay away from the Turtle.”

“Wow!” Fred said, “You never answered my question, but that was a strange peptalk.  You are encouraging me to hit the road?”

“No,” Home Wrecker replied.  “The love of Jesus is contagious, and I think the Turtle is the epicenter in our world.  If you join the team, your attitudes will start to change.”

Fred shrugged, “I have nothing against Christianity.  My folks took me to church sporadically.  I never saw much in it.  Why are all you Turtle team members so joyful and excited?”

Home Wrecker laughed, “Spend a few hours with Stinker and you will know why we call her Stinker.  You will go from feeling comfortable with your own lifestyle and within just a short time, you will want what Stinker has in her life.  Easy is easy.  He is her rock, the one to lean on when her energy is low.  B.B. joked that the only time Easy was ever excited was on his honeymoon, but if being steady, dependable, and wise beyond his years is what you want, get to know Easy.  As for Amazon and Kevin, about a year and a half ago, I doubt if either of them could spell B-I-B-L-E.”  Then singing, “That’s the book for me. I stand alone on the Word of God…  Sorry, if God wants you to join our little family, it will happen.  If you want to create an offense of some kind, Dr. Kildare might exclude you from consideration.  I doubt being a Christian is a prerequisite since there is half the core team members who became Christians while on a storm chase expedition.  I am just warning you.  Jesus is contagious, and Jemima comes close to being His Typhoid Mary, in a good way.  Jemima and B.B. are best friends, but if I were a little younger, we’d be a trio.  I love them both.”

The bedroom door opened.  “Who are the two that you love?” Dr. Ben asked, “Me and who else?  Be careful.  You have two children these days.”

Home Wrecker laughed, “There is familial love, Mama’s Man, and there is friendship love.  And I think you love all the members of the Turtle team too.”

Dr. Ben came up behind her and put his arms around her neck.  He kissed her on the cheek.  “Stinker and her girl talks brought the two of us together, and I realized my walk with Jesus was not up to par.  Yeah, I will not stand between you and your two girlfriends.”

Home Wrecker huffed, “So, you heard more than you pretended to hear?”

Dr. Ben said, “No, dear, when you have that far off stare, it is usually you thinking about what you would be doing right now if Jemima had not joined the Turtle team to be near her boyfriend.  We would not have a Turtle Team or a Storm Chasing Channel or a reality show where everyone is known by a code name.  And her joining Easy on that inaugural ride was her father’s idea.  Should we blame it all on Rev C.S.L.?”

Home Wrecker shrugged, “I was blaming it on Jesus.  And so far, I have never looked back with longing.  I love salt so much, I may be half a pillar of salt already.”

Dr. Ben asked, “Do you want me to check the weather so that you can get some sleep or burp little Joanie and get her off to bed?”

Home Wrecker laughed, “Both!”

Fred asked, “Why did you pick a name like Joan?”

Dr. Ben said, “If you say her name in government fashion with the first name last, she is Casey, Joan.  Add a possessive and you get Casey, Joan’s.  It is so subtle, most people don’t get it.”

Home Wrecker laughed, “And after she was born, the ladies at the Mommie Club at Lily the Pink asked me about the name.  I said what Ben said and then I added that if she wants to be a railroad engineer, she’s getting a lobotomy.  Most of the ladies sneered, but Mommie Pinkie and Aunt Gwen doubled over laughing.  I guess the epic story is not told to the younger generations about Casey Jones.”

And while this conversation was going on, Joseline was just getting finished with the setup in Pensacola.  Dr. Kildare made sure she knew where he wanted instruments, then he went inside.  Joseline, Mitzi, and Mike did the work.  Mitzi did not quite have the required upper body strength, but she did the best she could, and then Joseline pulled out her big stick – a torque wrench that her husband had let her borrow with a guide for the needed torque for each size of bolt.  The guide was laminated because he knew it would be raining.

Without thinking, they went into Dr. Kildare’s room without waiting after they knocked.  They found Dr. Kildare and Mags in bed together.

Amazon exclaimed, “Oh, dear Lord Jesus!  Let’s go back out you two.”

Dr. Kildare huffed, “We have our pajamas on.  Come in, but we have an announcement to make.  Mike already knows.  Mags and I are married.  We went to the courthouse last week.”

Amazon gushed, “Why not a big wedding in the Crystal Mountain?”

Mags said, “For one thing.  We are old.  For each of us it would be a second marriage. And Pink would make a big fuss.  When she hears about this, we will give our consent to a big wedding so that we can celebrate with our friends at Lily the Pink, but after this hurricane trip.”

Dr. Kildare said, “I wanted this one to have no baggage for either of us.”

Amazon said, “Baggage?  I have heard Mags give her testimony, how she did not realize how much Larry loved her until after he was murdered.  But if anyone had an ideal marriage, it would be you, Dr. Kildare.”

He smiled, “So little you know.  By the way, how is Misty?”

Amazon said, “She’s still sleeping, but are you trying to change the subject?”

He laughed, “No, I thought that once I start my story, I did not want an interruption, but infants have their own schedule.  I’ll have to risk it.  I grew up in a coal mining town outside of Pittsburgh, PA.  That is kind of redundant.  Not every town outside Pittsburgh is a coal mining town, but there are a lot of them.  If it wasn’t a coal mine, it was a steel mill.  But that is the way I remember it, at least.  My parents had good jobs, and we lived in a nice neighborhood.  Natalie lived next door to us.  Her parents had a nice backyard, and they added a pool when Nat was in middle school.  She was a year younger than I was, and we kind of grew up like brother and sister.  I was always the boy who kept her safe.  Her parents went to church on Christmas and Easter, but my folks were regular church goers.  When I started youth group, I became a Christian.  A year later, I invited Nat to go with me.  Everyone at youth group saw us as a couple.  I never thought any different.  I hadn’t thought any different since I was in first grade, and she was in kindergarten.  I was her protector, although I was never of the size to do such a thing.  But then, I graduated from high school, and I went to Penn State.  Nat was beautiful, popular, a cheerleader.  And I asked if she would wait for me.  She looked at me like I was crazy.  Of course, she would wait for me.  But we had never become romantic.  We might kiss.  We hugged a lot. And she was going with me to youth group at church.”

Dr. Kildare sighed.  “At Thanksgiving, she was off visiting relatives.  At Christmas, she was at a funeral which explained why she was not around at Thanksgiving.  I had my first ever storm chase during Spring Break.  So, I came home in late May.  I wanted to be there for her graduation.  I heard giggling and muffled noises from her pool side.  We had a hedge and they had to have a fence.  I peaked through.  She was having sex with a boy from the youth group.  I spent the rest of the day nearly catatonic.  The next morning, I went into my backyard.  I was going to confront her.  But I heard other noises.  She was having sex with a large boy from school, maybe a football player.  When they were finished, he left.  I went in to tell her that I was hurt deeply.  She had not waited as I thought the term was meant.  I was not yelling.  It was more like I was crying.  She had betrayed me so deeply.  But she heard none of it.  She had been pulling my clothes off.  She even commented about how she thought I would never get home.  And we made love.  We swam in the pool without any clothes on.  I think they call that skinny dipping.  Then we made love again.  I went home and cried myself to sleep.  She had betrayed me, but then I betrayed God.  But I was madly in love with her, and the only way to keep her to myself was to continue what we had done that day.”

He continued, “Her reason for not being home at Thanksgiving and Christmas was that the last of her grandparents had died.  Her parents now had enough money to send her to Penn State.  They had rented a condo for her that was a two bedroom.  Her parents and mine told everyone that we were staying in a two-bedroom condo, just like a brother and sister should do.  Our parents knew what we were doing, but we slept in one room and rented the other bedroom, usually with good success.  But my junior year and her sophomore year, we rented the room to a Christian, one that followed Jesus and obeyed.  He got Nat to attend a rally with him, and she accepted Jesus.  She came back to the apartment that night, angry with me.  She knew I was a believer, but I did not act like it.  For a while, I slept on the couch, and then she said that I could return to the bedroom if I asked her to marry her.  That is the first time that either of us talked about the topic.  I agreed, but we decided to have an official marriage after she graduated.  Without any discussion about what we had been doing, we went home after her graduation.  We had a big church wedding, and she wore white.  Then we went back to Penn State.  She got work as a substitute teacher and I finished my graduate degree.  I went to Florida State for my doctorate.  Nat had two children while in Tallahassee.  Our youngest was born in Tracy.  So, when we moved to Tracy, all our wrong turns were behind us.  No one knew of our past.  The story was that we were next-door neighbors who had always loved each other, and we got married.”

Amazon seemed to take in the first breath since his confession started.  “Wow!  It is amazing how God takes broken people and fixes them.  It seems more real when you see that these perfect couples were not so perfect.”  At that point, Joseline heard her baby crying.

Mitzi said, “So, this trip is your honeymoon?  Why did Mike come along?  To be the witness that you were married?”

Dr. Kildare said, “Mike is the reason that Mags joined us.  We wanted someone around fourteen to accompany us.  Mike qualified.  We wanted someone who had an interest in the weather.  Mike built a scale model of the Crystal Mountain for a science project, a terrarium with water pumps to have a water fall and other features that the crystal mountain has.  He did all the glass cutting and forming of the mountain.  And he has produced some weather events, but not the same as what we actually observed.  I did not even see it until he had observed data.  He asked me what he did wrong, and I was flabbergasted at what he’d done right.  He is a slightly above average student, but he is getting better.  And where his passion is, no one is ahead of him.  He may turn some heads in high school.  Now, I am sure that camera on the wall got my entire story, and the entire team will know soon.  And as for Mags, she is healing.  So, get to work.  The storm has not fully arrived, and I want all three of you to explain what you are seeing.  We work shifts through the night.  You wake me with anything major.”

And after a ton of data collection during what became a Cat 2 hurricane, we were on our way home.  We had stopped at a rest area so that we could caravan from that point, and a few passengers swapped vehicles.  Arabella was yearning to sit next to her boyfriend, Michael, in the Casey’s SUV, but she had to settle for sitting in the same vehicle.  But Fred went to the party wagon.  Wilma joined him there, putting the three younger college students with Dr. Kildare, Mags, and Mike.  And Joseline went to the Turtle with Misty.  Yes, that put two infants in the Turtle storm chasing vehicle.

So, on the way back home, God had something in store for us.  We were not thinking of storm chasing.  We were simply taking two days to get home, in plenty of time for our three high school freshmen to get ready for school.  Joseph and Mary were doing a lot of handholding.  To be honest, on long runs of interstate highway, Easy and I did too.  Everything was quiet so that Amazon could keep the two babies calm and hopefully asleep.

Then Easy saw the typical clouds in the distance.  He mentioned that to Mary.  Mary started fiddling with the radar screens until she saw something that might be something.  The Turtle was the lead vehicle and without saying what they were doing…  The reason was that no one in the Turtle had given it a conscious thought…

We pulled off at the next exit, followed by the other two vehicles.  Then B.B. said that we had a debris signature on the radar.  As we reached a forest with trees on either side of the road, causing us to lose sight of the tornado, Easy started asking for directions and escape routes.

Then we got to a field, and we saw the tornado had changed direction and was headed toward us.  Easy sped up and barked orders that he needed a dirt or gravel shoulder – fast!  B.B. said, “200 meters ahead on the right, a ramp down into a farmer’s field.”  By the time she said all that, we were on the ramp designed for tractors to get from the road to the field for plowing.

The tornado ripped past near our location, but our shields and anchors were deployed.  We were safe.

Then the angry phone calls came in.  Dr. Kildare put us on a group chat.  He asked, “What were you thinking?  You have children on board!”  Home Wrecker asked, “I thought I said no storm chasing with babies on board?  How are they?”  Although the phone was on speaker, Amazon took the phone, “I’ll let them tell you.  This is Misty.”  Misty was not happy, but she wasn’t crying.  Then Amazon said, “This is Stormie.”  She had a profound and robust belly laugh, and then it happened.  Stormie squealed with delight, with a high-pitched and very loud, “Eeeeeee!”

Easy reached over and grabbed my hand, “Remember that meltdown last summer on the last storm chase before you took your maternity leave?  Those were not kicks of fear.  Those were kicks because she liked it.”

I looked into his eyes and said, “Our prayers are answered.  We have another storm chaser in the family.”

B.B. said, “Let’s plan your children’s futures later.  That was a large debris signature.  Let’s double back and see if we have any casualties.”

Home Wrecker said, “Good idea.  Lead the way.  You have the data to find it.”

As it turned out, it was only a barn.  The farmer would quibble over the word “only”, but at least no one was injured, not even any livestock lost.

Credits

Other than this story starting with Part 1, I do not see the need for Credits.

There are two college students, Fred and Wilma, and their connections, or lack there of, to the television show, The Flintstones, will be in a future episode.

And a baby’s squeals of delight start about eight months.