As The Storm Clouds Gather: A Personal Story Part 5

What happens next is going to be the hardest part to write about. To survive everything that happened on the first hit only to be ripped out from my Mother’s grasp and once again be carried off was unbelievable to me. What could I do to stop the madness of it? How could I save myself? No one could even find me to try to save me. My thoughts turned to God.

My Mother was the only witness to see the monster come back and take me again. I have never talked about what happened and how I managed to survive the experience to her or to anyone else. I have always just skipped over that part of the story. Even my mother will tell you that the tornado carried me off again and then will skip that part and smoothly continue on.

I decided not to talk about it because I thought and still do that most people would not believe me. No one seemed to or seems to believe in miracles anymore. In 1968 the world was changing with the hippie movement on one side talking about peace and love. While on the other side was the Vietnam War with the protesters and the rioters tearing up the streets. Who wanted to hear a 12 year old's version of a miracle with the world in constant upheaval?

But thinking about and writing about the storm over the past few days and trying to decide whether to include or skip over this part again, I realized that it just wasn’t me that had not been telling the full story. But that all of us had a part of the terrifying experience that we never talked about.

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As The Storm Clouds Gather: A Personal Story Part 4

Something told me to run and to run like hell. I darted into the direction I thought would be away from it … but it was too late. I was immediately lifted just off the ground and was running in midair and then I started to spin. Someone grabbed hold of my left leg and pulled me back down to the ground. It was my Mother!

But I made the mistake of immediately standing up again. This time there was no hesitation on the storms insistence on taking me.  It had me again and it was not going to let me go. I heard my Mother cry out in anguish as she once more tried to reach out and save what may have been the only child left out of the five she had carried ...

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As The Storm Clouds Gather: A Personal Story Part 3

The moment of impending death to my 12 year old mind was more than I could take.  My whole body began to shake as I sat waiting for it. I had pleaded with God all that day for everything to get back to normal  and when I went to bed that night with a horrible stomach ache, I reminded him of my prayer. But waking up now it was obvious he had ignored my plea.

That morning I knew the day wasn’t going to be right. When I stepped outside to walk to the bus stop I noticed that the sun was way too bright.  “Damn it”, I had said to myself.  I was done with everything being all shiny and new. Nothing had been the same since we had moved into our new mobile home. It was like we just didn’t fit. There just wasn’t anything real about it. Now here I am sitting in bed waiting to die? I don’t even get the chance to fight? My mind then began to cry out, “Tina? Tina? Where are you?”

The mobile home began to rock. Out of time I thought ...

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As The Storm Clouds Gather: A Personal Story Part 2

4:45 pm. No Mom or Jennifer. Where were they? I was feeling somewhat better and got dinner for us. Then I stepped outside for just a moment. The neighbor lady was walking by and she told me that there was a Tornado Watch until 11 pm and to be sure to tell my Mother. “Okay” was all I said. The sky looked fine to me so I never gave it another thought.

8:50 pm. It was still pouring down rain very hard and the wind was blowing. Mom made a comment to me that the dog and cat were acting strange. I asked her what did she mean and she replied the dog seemed to be pacing and the cat was jumpy. My stomach ache was suddenly back again. I finished my homework. I told Mom I was sick and wanted to go to bed. Debbie had company over for the night, so she told me to go sleep in her bed and she would take the couch.

I was glad to finally be in bed. I then quickly reminded God of my prayers for everything to be normal by tomorrow morning. I glanced at the clock which said 9:15. I rolled over onto my stomach; I had no idea that in two hours, at 11:15 pm exactly, that same clock was going to come to a stop forever.

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As The Storm Clouds Gather: A Personal Story

As I began to awake I knew something was wrong. My Mother standing over me, trying to get me to move in a voice filled with fear. The telephone was ringing, the bedroom door stood ajar with a single light being cast down the long hallway from the Living room. I felt my youngest sister lying beside me and my body was suddenly hot and sweaty from her being so close to me as she slept. Jennifer Lynn. In all of her childhood moments she never let me get to far from her sight. That night was no different. I sat up and looked at my Mother and calmly said “Oh” as if I had been expecting it.

I sat in bed looking at the light coming down the hallway. Then I heard the next to the youngest sister’s feet hit the floor as she jumped down from the top bunk in her bedroom. Glancing quickly, I saw the rest of my sisters and one of their friends standing huddled in a corner. Back to the door my eyes went and in horror I watched as everything went into slow motion while my Mother was reaching for the door in a desperate attempt to keep it open until the last one of us was in the bedroom. But Tina never made it.

I watched her shadow in the hallway disappear just before the bedroom door was jerked from my Mother’s hands and slammed shut. The lights went out but the phone kept up its eerily ringing for a few seconds longer.  Then that fear of complete silence crept in as we all waited in the dark for it to come take us. A heavy stillness hung in the air.

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An Independent Review On Gold Medal Wine Club by RevueZzle

This independent revue was done by
REVUEZZLE

This week I decided to put Gold Medal Wine Club on the spotlight itself. I looked at many different reviews, (2014, 2015) where they were compared against other wine clubs. On average they were rated a 3 star out of the best top 5 and for the wine collectors they had an average rate of 2 out of 5.

Although these reviews were good overall, to me they were not defined enough and what kept standing out was the fact that they all said Gold Medal had very strict standards. So then, why were they rated a 3 average instead of a one or a two I kept asking myself? So, I went through all of the reviews again to find the common denominator. Price is what it came down to. All of the reviews said that compared to other wine clubs, that compared to other wine clubs, GM’s were higher.

Perhaps I am wrong, but I don’t think price should be in any part of a rating. I want to know about the wine. I can decide on what price I will pay. What I want is the rating on quality, their standards and consistency on those standards. How about special requests on hard to find wine? Are they flexible enough on delivery? What about customer service, do they excel? Is the website informative and user friendly? What about their guarantees?

So, I scrapped all of those reviews and instead looked for a good independent “stand alone” review and I wanted to get as current as I could. What follows is one of the most detailed I could find. In fact, so detailed, I did not include all of it, but you can find the full review at

revuezzle.com

Fall 2015

If you are on the hunt for those hard-to-find or highly rated wines, Gold Medal Wine Club is here to serve. As an independent wine club, they bring the most refined selections from boutique wineries around the globe to your door. With over six memberships and a PLUS add-on program, there is certainly a membership to suit everyone at Gold Medal Wine Club.

“Their specialty is award winning high quality wines from 

around the world.”

For The Detailed Review

For More Information

Gold Medal Wine Club

DELIVERED TO YOUR DOOR

America's Leading Independent Wine Club since 1992

Celebrating 25 years

"The wines produced by these boutique wineries are

among the best in the world."

Passion In A Bottle

On The Spotlight

Valley Legend Wines

Valley Legend Wines is the result of a passion to make wine without compromise. Concentrating on the fundamentals and the history of wine making, winemaker Greg Lawson’s philosophy is to, “Allow the uncorrupted aspect of the process to flourish and accentuate.”

Their specialties, Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot, Valley Legend Wines states that they will only “work with the best of the best and prefers to let their wines speak for themselves”

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For More Information

www.goldmedal.com

http://www.valleylegend.com/

A passion becoming reality takes time, persistence, patience, faith, desire, and fearlessness. The Valley Legend wine project is the direct result of a constant dream to make a wine without compromise. To focus on the true fundamentals of winemaking and combine them with world class winemakers, the benefits of modern technology and technique and an undying respect for history.