Bring May flowers

Some days seem to just amount to being awful. I don't know why. It seems like everything evil waits until it has backup to make an attack on us. Yesterday was one of those attacks.

Yesterday, my mom went in for an MRI. She's had bad health for as long as I can remember. They wanted to check out something in her brain. At this point, nothing surprises me with her. She's always under more duress than any person should have to undergo. But this instance was especially hard to deal with... it was affecting her mind.

So I had that on my mind on my way to school. I didn't even leave the driveway and my wife called me, "Babe! There is a tornado coming! You need to come back inside."

"Relax," I told her, "you freak out to easily. Everything will be fine." And I was on my way to school.

I went in the library and sat down at a computer to start my research for a project. Not fifteen minutes later, we got text messages from the school telling us that we were to take shelter because the tornado was heading our way. We all took cover, and the first thing I thought was, "Steph..." Her safety was the only thing on my mind, but I very well couldn't leave and try to drive on the highway. The tornado seemed to be taking the freeway directly towards our house.

Well, after waiting in the lower section of a secure building, we were all released back to our work... only to receive another text message about the tornado coming back.

Once again no harm came to us. The alert was lifted, and we went back to our work. As I was sitting over at my computer, I looked over at the guy at the computer next to me. His face was stone, "She's dead..." he muttered.

"What?" I couldn't help but read his email. LBC put out a mass email telling us that one of our fellow students was found dead in her apartment that morning.

Everything else that was bothering me that day got put on the back burner. I knew the girl. Not well, but well enough to have a conversation. I couldn't believe that she was gone.

There was a somber mood all over campus for the next few hours. I was included in the sorrowful crowd, but then something miraculous happened. I was walking between the trees, and I smelt something that normal Lancaster county atmosphere drowns out: flowers.

Lancaster is known for having poor air quality and quite a bit of fertilizer lingering in the air. It was really nice to smell the freshness of spring for once.

Then I realized that the only way I could smell the flowers was for the storm from the tornado to wash the air of all the junk that normally floats around in it. Then I started thinking about the girl. No matter how horrible the situation is, she is in Heaven now with her Lord, our Lord.

Then I started thinking about my mom. Everything's going to be okay... some way or another.