I Have a History With Hurricanes by Vonnie Davis

Remember how I freaked out in my last posting about pitching at the Cleveland Rocks Romance convention? I wondered if I could cancel my flight reservations.

Had I known Hurricane Florence would slam the Eastern Coast in a few days, I wouldn't have joked the way I did. On Friday I have flight reservations to fly from south-central Virginia to Charlotte, NC. From there I fly to Cleveland. Our small local airport only has flights to Charlotte or Atlanta. None go North.

Need I remind you Hurricane Florence is slated to strike the coast of North Carolina sometime on Friday?

So, I have no clue if I'm going, or not. Will flights be cancelled? Will I use my "Granny Chicken" card and stay safely at home? I dunno. See, I have a history with hurricanes. Oh, nothing drastic. Just memorable.

I was a week shy of entering first grade when my parents took me on a  vacation to Ocean City, New Jersey. Hurricane Hazel decided to meet us there. My parents had no clue what they were in for as we walked the deserted boardwalk. It was their first trip to the ocean, too. They'd rarely left the farm.

Waves kept coming closer and closer. The edge of the boardwalk grew more wet with every roll of the surf. Suddenly I got knocked over and rolled toward a closed business. My dad grabbed me around the waist like a bag of potatoes and ran for our hotel, dragging my mother in tow. I choked and coughed and cried.

My parents never did go back to the shore.

Nearly 14 years later, I was a Navy wife with a five-month old baby when Hurricane Doria set her sights for the Virginia coastline. We were living in a small apartment along the Chesapeake Bay in Norfolk. When the men were called to their ships to ready them to sail for deeper waters to ride out the hurricane, another Navy wife and I drove the guys to their ship and dropped them off. Marsha and I decided to spend the next few days at their apartment farther inland.

I parked our red beetle along the curb as torrential rains fell. We both rushed into the apartment complex with our babies. She put them both in the crib while I ran out to get my daughter's clothes, diapers, and formula. The car was gone! It was floating down the street. I ran after it as winds blew the little car from the street across the sidewalk and through a spindly hedge. It was finally embedded between two pine trees. I grabbed a rope from the tool box and tied Trigger Beetle to one of the trees. I was wading through water to my shins. Oh, the glory of an armed forces wife.

Fast forward six years and we are living in south-central Pennsylvania when Hurricane Agnes made her presence known. I was six months pregnant with my youngest and he wanted to make his presence known, too. I'd gone into labor.

My doctor had to drive through flooded roads to meet me at the hospital. With medication and bed rest, the contractions finally stopped. Mike didn't come for another three months. The doctor said the change in barometric pressure was throwing a lot of his pregnant patients into labor. Who knew?

Now, Hurricane Florence is looming!

Will I go or will I stay? Will flights be cancelled? Will I get to give the pitch I've drafted? Stay tuned..