It's Good to Be Home

I'm back.

I didn't think I'd ever make it home, but I'm finally back.

This quite possibly has been the longest week of my life. Even longer than when I went to Girl Scout camp in 4th grade and faked being sick so they'd call my mom and she would have to come get me. (They didn't call her, by the way.)

I left home on Sunday and drove 3-4 hours to Bolivar, MO to take a class. I knew I was off to a poor start when I hit a detour on Hwy 32. This detour was 30 extra minutes of driving for what would have been 10 minutes normally. And to make matters worse, if I'd just stayed on the interstate a bit longer, I would have missed said detour altogether. Lesson learned. I made sure to avoid the detour as I drove back today.

On Monday, I went to class where I found out that some of the other ladies in the class were staying in the dorms for $25 a night. I had been told by someone at the university that it was cheaper to stay at a hotel. So on Monday, I made arrangements to move into a dorm (although I had to wait until Tuesday to make the move, since all of my stuff was still at the hotel, and would be there past check out time).

Tuesday morning (still at the hotel), I was awakened by a TORNADO SIREN an entire hour before my alarm was set to go off. At first, I thought a neighboring shower was just obnoxiously loud, but then I woke up enough to realize what the noise was. So I turned on the television and found a news broadcast. There's nothing quite as scary as being in an unfamiliar town in the MIDDLE OF TORNADO ALLEY with tornado sirens wailing at you, and watching the radar but not having any sense of where anything is since you don't live there. It took every fiber of my being not to call my husband back home and wake him. The logical part of me knew that from that far away there was nothing he could do for me, and that I would just worry him by calling. So, I worked on packing up my stuff and I prayed. Finally, I decided to take a quick shower and get ready. I figured the shower was the safest spot in the hotel room. I realize now, after a phone conversation with my older sister, that perhaps taking a shower wasn't the smartest idea at the time. But I really needed to be productive and get my mind off the situation. That did the trick. By the time I was out of the shower, the warning had expired. When I checked out, the lady at the desk reassured me, though. "Oh, that was nothing to worry about," she said. "It was 4 or 5 miles away from here." I don't know about you, but I personally like my tornadoes to be much further than 4-5 miles away.

The rest of the week was fairly uneventful, which is good, because I had a TON of homework for my class. I kept very busy. I learned a lot and made some good friends. But I busted my tail doing it.

I can now say that I have lived in a dorm, even if it was for just a short few days. I have had the experience of the communal bathroom and shower. The way I see it, I'm set for life on that count. If I never have to worry about dropping my clean, dry shirt on the wet, nasty shower floor ever again I think I'll be okay with that.

I made it through a week without my babies and they made it through a week without me. I knew they would be fine, though. They had the best daddy in the world at home taking care of them. I don't think it ever even occurred to them to miss me (except when I called and said that I missed them) because they were having such a great time with Daddy. They also had Miss Amy and Flynn and Gabe (a.k.a. "Gave") to help fill their days--PS, thanks Amy!!! I really appreciate it!

So now I am just 4 assignments, one class meeting and one graduation ceremony away from my masters degree. I'm on the downhill slide. I have one more busy week ahead of me and then I can enjoy my summer.

Maybe then I'll have something interesting to blog about.