Water, water everywhere...

Apparently, I wasn’t supposed to leave the house this morning.

The day started out uneventfully enough. I woke up early and headed to the gym. It was raining hard, but I made it there and back with no problems.

Once back home, I quickly showered, dressed and headed out to meet Jean at my aunt’s house in the Lakewood area of East Dallas. This little side trip was on my way to work, and had the added benefit of being able to drop Alley off at Trevor’s apartment.

It was still raining when I left my house, but I didn’t think very much of it. It had been raining more or less nonstop since 7 PM last night, and the morning news hinted that the rain would be with us for most of the morning.

When I turned south on Abrams, however, the weather got little more interesting. The wind and rain picked up, and it started to hail. The storm drains were bubbling over with all the excess water, and the street started to flood right in front of me. I continued on, though, thinking the cell would quickly pass. I honestly wasn’t concerned. Until, that is, I encountered a particularly hilly section of Abrams near St. Thomas Aquinas. There is a creek at a low point just south of the school, and the water rushing downhill off of Abrams suddenly looked like a raging river. Just below the point where the street and creek met, a giant whirlpool had formed – complete with churning rapids. Not wanting to dawdle at this dangerous spot – especially with the rapidly rising water - I gunned my Envoy back up the far side of the hill. The force of the water flowing downhill in the opposite direction, though, temporarily caused my SUV to fishtail a bit. That definitely got my attention.

Consequently, when I reached the crest of the next hill and saw the cars stalled out in the water below, I decided to turn off Abrams and wait for the storm to, you know, blow itself out a bit before continuing on. I wasn’t about to press my luck with high water for a second time. I’m not known for being excessively lucky, after all.

There was a car in front of me that also had pulled off Abrams to wait the storm out, and pulled up behind him on the curb to park. And that’s when I watched a tree limb fall in between my car and the SUV in front of me. How it managed to not hit us both is beyond me.

Lucky twice.

I maneuvered my way around the downed limb and parked my car along a section of curb void of trees. Thinking I should call and let people know that I was running late due to the weather, I pull my cell phone from my purse. At first, I couldn’t get a cell phone signal. I guess the weather was too bad. Once the rain started to ebb a little, though, I was able to call into work to let them know I was running late. Apparently, I wasn’t the only staffer experiencing trouble, however, and my boss told me to be careful and take my time.

I also phoned my aunt and asked her to call Jean. I was worried that she might already be at my aunt’s house, and I didn’t want anyone to worry about me being stuck out in the storm. Turned out that I didn’t need to worry. Jean was also running behind.

Finally, the rain let up enough for me to feel comfortable driving again. I wound my way through the neighborhoods just northeast of Lakewood. There was more than one time that I drove through water that was probably “too deep”, but none of these incidences compared to the one I had at the creek near St. Thomas Aquinas. And after a few minutes of turning this way and that, I managed to skirt the flooded low section on Abrams and come out at an intersection on higher ground.

From there, I continued south on Abrams until I hit Lakewood. It was obvious that Lakewood had no power, and it always baffles me how many people do not know proper procedure when encountering a dark traffic light. Grumble, grumble.

The intersection of Abrams and La Vista in Lakewood.

I was particularly shocked when I saw the intersection of Abrams and La Vista. All of the southbound lanes were completely submerged. Brookside was more of the same. The Lakewood Golf Course looked like an extension of White Rock lake. Huge trees had fallen in the roadway, and power lines dangled precariously from above. I carefully navigated around all the debris and managed to drop Alley off at Trevor’s apartment without incident. I then proceeded on to my aunt’s house.

Brookside. If you expand the image, you can clearly see downed powerlines tangled in the branches of the limb on the street.

Brookside heading east.

I arrived safely, but noticed immediately that Jean was nowhere to be seen. She had been trying to reach me, however. I realized that I must have missed her call when I was taking Alley into Trevor’s apartment.

Jean had apparently tried to drive through high water at the intersection of Skillman and Richmond in her brand-new, white Mercedes, and stalled. The water – still rising – started to flow under the car doors and flooded the interior. Her voice was audibly shaky, and I told her I’d come right over to help.

It took me less than three minutes to reach Jean from my aunt's house. The intersection of Skillman and Richmond was quite the sight. Huge trees had fallen over, debris was everywhere and the water was deep and still rising. In the middle of it all was Jean, still sitting in her car surrounded by what looked like a large pond.

Near where Jean's car was submerged.

In my effort to help her, I got absolutely soaked. Finally, however, the fire department (with press following behind) arrived and the water started to subside enough for Jean to be able to exit her car and make it to the sidewalk. We stood there for a few minutes while Jean called her husband and arranged for a tow truck. Then, we got into my car and just kind of hung out for a few minutes until she got every thing in order and under control.

Around 10:15, Jean told me that the tow truck was coming and I should go home, change clothes and get to work. I offered to wait with her until the tow truck arrived, but – seeing me shiver – Jean ordered me on. I was cold, and didn’t put up much of a fight.

The drive back home was a real eye opener. Everywhere I looked there were downed trees and power lines. I passed three trees on Skillman alone that were the recent charred victims of lightening strikes. One was still smoldering.

Downed trees on Skillman looking south from Richmond.

I made it home just before another cell hit. From my bedroom window, I could see wind wildly whipping the trees around and it started to appear like it was raining sideways.

Concerned about encountering more high water on my second attempt to get to work, I decided to call the office and explain what had happened to Jean, her car and my clothes. I told them I was at home changing into something dry and that I’d be on my way as soon as the current storm subsided. I asked one of my coworkers to look up the weather, and she told me that I should plan on sitting tight until noon. The weather looked like it might clear up by then, and I could make it to the office without having to drive through all the heavy rain, hail, thunder and lightening.

After hanging up the phone, I finished getting dried off and redressed. I was hanging my completely saturated clothes up in the bathroom when I heard a loud “drip”. At first, I ignored it. I figured I was hearing it from somewhere outside. It was pouring, after all. But when I heard it for a second and third time, I started looking around the house for the noise’s source.

I found it in the hall closet directly behind the fire place in the den.

Water was seeping in from…well, somewhere, and the drywall in the corner of the ceiling was swollen and starting to drip. Without thinking, I ran in to the kitchen, dumped everything out of a plastic, purple trashcan, grabbed a butter knife and returned to the closet. Once there, I put the trashcan on the floor, and stabbed the bulge with the butter knife. Water instantly started to pour down from the ceiling. I then ran to the attic stairs, pulled them down and turned on the light – looking desperately for the water’s source. And nothing. No dripping. No wet insulation. Nothing. Not even on the attic portion of the chimney.

Confused, I ran back down to the hall closet. Water continued to pour out of the ceiling and into the trashcan. And when I took a step closer to further assess the situation, I stepped in a puddle.

In my head, I wondered why I puddle had formed. That is, until I saw the problem: The d@mn trashcan had a hole in the bottom.

Screaming aloud in frustrated anger, I sprinted to the garage, found a plastic bin (still full of stuff from the move), dumped the contents out all over the floor and brought the bin inside to replace the busted trashcan.

The hole in the trashcan was the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back. I was dealing with things way beyond my maturity level – especially after the emotionally and physically exhausting morning I’d already had. Amazingly, I held it together long enough to call work and take a Personal Day. The thought of leaving my new house in a thunderstorm with a leaky ceiling was just more than I could bear.

Then, I did what anybody would do under the circumstances: I called my mommy and broke down in tears.

Trevor contacted a roofing company, and a roof guy was able to swing by around three this afternoon. A thorough inspection of the attic revealed exactly what I had found earlier: Nothing. That’s right, no wet insulation, no wet beams – not even any wet bricks around the chimney. He even stuck a long wire through the hole I made with the butter knife, and inspected all around the area. Again, nothing.

Knowing a problem existed somewhere, he went up on the roof and filled every crack, crevices and tiny gap he could find. There were no damaged or missing roof tiles (I thought the leak might be a result of wind or hail damage during the storms), and he could see nothing that suggested where or why water was getting inside. When I told him that the leak started after I noticed it raining sideways, though, he guessed that it could have been part of the reason behind the “mystery leak”. But really, no one knows for sure.

Doing all he could possibly do, the roofer left. He asked that we leave the plastic bin in place under the hole just incase the problem isn’t fixed, and call if we experience any more problems. Since it looks like it might rain again tonight or tomorrow, we may be testing his quick fix very soon. Keep your fingers crossed!

All in all, I guess this has been the luckiest unlucky day ever. Several near misses driving around in stormy weather, being close enough to help a friend in need – even having to go home to change clothes in time to catch what easily could have been a devastating leak. Not only could the leak - undetected – cause hundreds of dollars of damage to the drywall and wood floors, but Trevor and I have been temporarily storing most of our artwork in the hall closet while we get settled in the new house.

Maybe I am lucky after all?

Really, though, I’m just exhausted and I am looking forward to hitting the sack early tonight. Whew. What a day…

The calm after the storm:
Mammary Clouds
(a.k.a. "Booby Clouds"):

Update: I just found out the museum I work for did not fair well. Apparently, roof repairs coupled with a torrential 15 hour downpour can really screw things up. Tragically, it sounds like some of the 73 year old ceilings took the brunt of the damage. And, whereas past floods have been confined to the basement, this one was upstairs. Not good. Not good at all.

Deep sigh...