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It’s hot out here on the prairie in the summer. That’s the way summer is, but today feels different. Today the air is still, unnaturally quiet and there is an oppressive feel to it as if the air got suddenly heavier. The chickens have all found places to roost and there isn’t a sound out of any of them, even the old rooster has gone silent. The light has gone different too, going from the usual bright blue to a kind of sullen blue-grey color with a tinge of green that doesn’t feel right. Mom’s in the house getting ready to start canning. It’s been a struggle to keep the rabbits and deer out of the garden and she’s got to save what she has harvested so far. Dad’s out in the field trying his damnest to get the seed in before the rain hits. Claude and Old Bill don’t like the clouds forming or the way it has got quiet all of a sudden and they are hard to keep straight. Dad has been giving them hell. Seed’s expensive and it has to go down right or the yield won’t be there.

If you look close you can see skinny little kids with angular faces and very serious expressions playing out behind the shed. They had been hitting something with sticks a little while before, you couldn’t see what it was but whatever it was they were intent on making its life miserable. They’re not bad kids but a hard life makes for hard play.

The shed door started banging against its hinges as the wind kicked up and inside the cow is pulling against its rope. It doesn’t like the feeling in the air and wants outside. It’s only a little after noon and the sky is darkening for as far as you can see. These clouds mean only one thing and it is the worst thing you can have besides fire. Their rounded, puffy bottoms are a prelude to one of the great devastations visited on this land. Off in the far forty Dad is turning the team towards home. He’s about to turn them loose and jump on back of old Bill to beat the wind and get everybody rounded up. Mom has shut down the stove and damped the fire, canning can wait.

With everybody accounted for and Dad home cutting the horses loose to fend for themselves it’s time to pull open the root cellar door and enter the cool earthy smelling darkness. Mom brought the loaf of bread from the oven and her bible, Dad’s got the kerosene lantern lit and the kids are staring wide-eyed at the last sliver of daylight as the cellar door gets pulled down tight and locked. Maybe next year if everything goes right  they can get an electric light down there but I guess that would only last until the twister took out the power poles so maybe they’ll save their money. The littlest one is hanging on to her sister and listening as if her life depended on it as her brother tells how the twister will sound like a freight train from hell as it passes by and maybe suck them right up out of the ground if it has a mind to. Lots of people have been sucked up out of the ground, blown away and just killed, he says, but his big sister says Dad won’t let that happen and he should just shush. Besides he was the one that wet his pants the last time he was so scared so he shouldn’t be trying to scare any one else.

If they’re lucky the twister will miss the house and the out buildings and their livestock will make it. So far they’ve been lucky. This isn’t their first storm but it doesn’t get easier with each one, just the opposite in fact. Dry land farming and life out here in general is a tough way to make it go what with the drought, the fires, the winds, the dust storms, the grasshoppers and the tornadoes. This is real Grapes of Wrath stuff here, gritty, hard-edged and no holds barred life on the plains but these are strong people and they have faith they can make it. I believe they can too, but it’s going to be a long afternoon none the less.