METAMORPHOSIS: Building the Dome of a Home

The winds spawned an F-1 tornado that skipped across the island. The evident swath across our
neighborhood included damage to our 12 on 12 pitch roof. The tornado ripped off one third of the
roof and left us a souvenir board diagonally extruding from the east side of the house. The wind
ripped off the canopy of the city's majestic trees and left much of the area without power. Tree
branches and downed power lines made driving dangerous. To make matters even more
miserable, we were not allowed back on the island for several days. Not knowing the condition of
our home made the event even more traumatic.
Unbeknownst at that
time, we would receive
a one-two punch that
would leave us reeling.
Two months later, on
October 4, 1995,
Hurricane Opal
delivered the second
punch of the season.
We were in shock! In
our first 20 months of
living on the beach, we
had been affected by
three storms. My trust
in the locals'
assurances about
storms was, well, let's
say compromised. If
these events had
occurred during the
superstitious era of the
witch trials, I would have been concerned for our safety. Here we were, newcomers to this small
island community that had no recent history of storms until we moved in. Centuries ago, our
nightmares of walls of water and the island flooding would have sealed our fate.
Hurricane Opal was a much larger storm than Hurricane Erin. It strengthened to almost a
Category 5 storm in the Gulf when it was 250 miles southwest of Pensacola, Florida. The
residents were dazed zombies making preparations for the second storm in two months. The
tension was palpable as we stood in lines for supplies. Like us, most people had not had time to
make repairs from Erin. The impending sense of doom was reflected in the eyes of the residents.
We had tried everything, short of having Valerie standing naked on the street corner waving cash,
to hire a roofer after Hurricane Erin. With our 12 on 12 pitch roof, no roofer would risk his crew on
such a steep incline. At Valerie's urging, I climbed onto the roof toting my blue tarp. I needed her
help so she climbed the ladder and proceeded to freeze. Rooted to the roof and unable to move,
Valerie‟s fear froze her so completely she was incapable of climbing further up the roof or
navigating down the ladder. Fortunately, our neighbor, Vic Mitchell, was on his deck, assessed
the situation, and was able to talk her down. Never again did she ask me to get on the roof.
Even though our roof still sported a blue tarp, which we knew was no match for the upcoming
winds, we made what preparations we could. Knowing water would enter our patched roof, we
still elected to seal the windows and doors with plywood and caulking once again. We moved our
outdoor furniture inside the upstairs screened porch and placed items from the garage into the
kitchen.
None of the neighbors were laughing at the newbies now, even though Opal's path was not a
certainty yet.
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