Last night our church choir held a little gathering at the Missouri Botanical Garden. Boxed lunches, lawn chairs, live music, kids running through fountains. Apart from the triple-digit heat, it promised to be a fine evening.

Ian was a little cautious about abandoning himself to the lure of freely accessible, gushing water, but caught the mood once I swung him through the spouts. The handful of other kids, running pell-mell through the spray didn’t hurt, either. The pain of hitting concrete with your face is inversely proportional to the size of the puddle which caused the fall.

As we ate our chicken sandwiches and talked with friends, we all noticed the encroaching darkness from the west. Our only response to the sudden, cool breezes was a collective sigh of relief. And when an annoucement was made about the concert being postponed for a few minutes, while the ‘quick’ and ‘narrow’ front moved throgh, we all nodded and smiled, wanting it to be true. During St. Louis summers, rain is a myth, and always happens to someone else.

Had we been cattle, we would’ve run for the hills. Or the barn. Or wherever cows go when they don’t want to fly.

We reconsidered our optimism with the first gust. The second gust was accompanied by a loud crack, and we watched in shock as a limb fell from a towering sycamore and into a cluster of chairs below. We’d forgotten one of the cardinal rules of life in the Midwest: run for it. This works equally well for thunderstorms, July 4th celebrations, and cow-tipping.

When I saw the first limb fall, I ran to see what help me and my flip-flops could provide; I turned around when other limbs followed suit. When I got back to our chairs, I found Ian huddled in Kelly’s lap. She looked up at me and said, very calmly, ‘We have a scared little boy, here.’ I lifted Ian, and he—rather tightly—wrapped his arms around my neck. I walked to the nearest shelter; quickly, because of the storm and risk of asphyxiation.

As I walked, Ian talked. ‘That was quick! It’s just a storm. I like thunder. We’re safe; God made the storm.’ Kelly and Ian had prayed while I had helped with the first limb. Despite his reassurance and matter-of-fact expression, Ian was trembling. We blew into the gift shop, leaves in our hair and bark in our eyes. Everyone was laughing nervously, hair like windblown Albert Einsteins.

Inisde the gift shop, Ian was suave, debonaire; Hugh Hefner minus the hedonism and smoking jacket. If I moved closer to the windows—whipping trees, sheets of rain, jagged streaks of lightning—he would plant his feet and take my hand. ‘Not outside. Here, you need to sit here.’ Which wasn’t bad advice. People who live in glass houses should leave during a storm.

Apart from a little clutching and a little whimpering, Ian was calm, cool, and collected. Considering the ferocity of the storm—80mph winds, and the most damage our electric company has seen in 100 years—I was impressed. He did briefly lose his composure when the power went out while he was using the bathroom, but wouldn’t we all? He also refused to walk while we toured the atrium (after the storm had lessened), but, again, his instincts were good.

I think he’s used to it; this always seems to happen to our family. Two years ago we were caught in a gale on the Florida coast. Ian wailed as he watched his favorite water raft being torn from Mommy’s hands, and Daddy take a nosedive into the sand. The same thing happened on vacation earlier this year.

Does Professor X make house calls?

[ Update 7/21: As of now, approximately 400,000 homes are still without power. Ours came back this morning. Thanks, Ameren! ]

(Video by Phil, of The Booes.)