'Stormy weather'

    It has been a tough couple of weeks out here in Eastern Montana.  Not that other places don’t have bad weather, but we have had our share.   I am developing a close, personal relationship with my insurance company and thank goodness they are good people.  If it was just once I could understand it but I had a new roof put on in 2013 and now I have to deal with it again.                                             In 2013, the day before I was to head to Minneapolis for my niece’s wedding, we got clobbered with a terrific hailstorm.  That evening I was out picking up debris and doing what I could before I had to take off.  The next morning I headed east into the worst looking bank of storm clouds I have ever seen around Bismarck.  Managing to miss that I then answered phone calls from the claims adjuster and that I would deal with it all when I got home which involved a new roof.  There were roofing companies all over town since the hail was widespread.                                     In 2015, the town was hit by a microburst, I ended up with a mammoth tree branch in my front yard and wind damage -- again I got to know an adjuster.  About two weeks later as I was traveling, a deer came out of the ditch and slammed into my car doing about $3000 worth of damage.  I was beginning to think I was walking around with a “gypsy curse”.                                                    This year the town was hit by three hail storms.  One of them seemed to locate in our section of town because other folks did not have any hail.  I lost flowers and bushes stripped of blossoms and leaves.  I know this is nothing to losing a crop which is your livelihood, but it is still upsetting.  It gives me a tiny taste of what folks go through who lose homes to floods, fire, mudslides and tornadoes.  Of course, I got by easily in comparison.  But I am amazed at the energy it takes and the time involved to do a major clean up and then have to do it again.  When I think of Hurricane Katrina hitting the gulf coast area years ago and the repair and clean-up continues.  Than about the time the people put their lives back together another storm hits.  There must be something called “storm-shock” or a trauma identified with disasters such as these.                       One of the aspects of our lives in the summertime is watching the clouds and the sky.  If there is a bank of clouds to the north or west you eyeball it throughout the day and start to listen to the radio.  It is one of the benefits of living in “big sky country” that you have some advance warning that bad weather is on the way.  I have also discovered the National Weather app on my smart-phone which shows me the weather radar for the area.  It is really interesting to watch the clouds move through the area and which ones have areas with high winds and hail.  Last year the storm hit us twice.  There was no power for twenty-four hours but I could watch the radar on my phone and get ready for the second time it hit.  Standing in your house in the middle of a bad storm is a surreal experience.  I don’t have a basement so it is problematic where I should head when the bad weather starts.  Under the bed, I guess.