Closeup of hail, ice bullets from the sky
Austin Texas is almost completely out of glass. Last night around 1:00 AM I was trying to finish up my next blog post when yet another hard rain, typical lately, started pounding on the house around me. When the hail kicked in I just let it ride, enjoying the typewriter hammering that began to immerse me and letting it fuel my furious writing pace as I tried to get the post out and get to sleep. Then it got louder. And louder. It was far more intense than the previous few storms over the last weeks and I decided it was time to go check it out. I headed for the living room, grabbing a flashlight on the way (instincts!) and by then the sound was deafening and water was rushing in through the tops of all of our ancient window frames. Housemates poured down the stairs as the power cut out and we all backed away from the windows. The floor around the front door and windows was soaked and everyone kept warning each other to watch out for glass. Finally the onslaught quieted, ultimately receding into the night. The rain continued to sprinkle lightly as though a child looking up in wide-eyed innocence to say, “what? I didn’t do anything.”

Stories of heroism followed. Zuuv had covered his girlfriend and pulled a blanket over her head just minutes before the windows above them exploded inward and sent shards of glass across the room. In a torrent of rain he lifted her up and carried her into the closet.

Shattered window and the cause
The carnage was fairly impressive, with sixteen windows broken out of our old house. The hail and glass shot completely across most of the rooms where it made its way in. Throughout the experience I kept having the slowly building sensation that things were not typical, somehow worse than I was used to, and that I should be reacting more intensely to protect my friends. By the end my brain had fired through a complete list of all of my survival equipment and their locations. Backpacks, flints, knives, flashlight backups and stoves.

I can only imagine that this slow build, this sense that things really can’t really be that bad is what the people in Burma or Katrina might have felt. As our earth’s climate continues to shift and ultimately begins to make these events more common, maybe we’ll be better able to react. Being mentally aware that, yes, things could be bad enough that we need to head for the roof and a canoe will perhaps make us more skilled at survival and lessen some of the impact of these events.

The last image cemented in my brain before heading off to sleep was that of Zanson, returned to his laptop, using the final bits of battery power and a candle to finish his PhD dissertation that was due the following day. I’m happy to say that despite the storm he got everything finished and printed the next morning.

Note: The photos here were about all I could get in total darkness with a flash. These little ice monsters from the sky were huge!