It started off like any normal day. It was sunny and cool. I had just got back from visiting my family in my hometown. I had laundry to do because I had work on Tuesday. I had planned to stay home and eat pizza and watch movies with my friend. We were keeping an eye on the weather due to the storm in my hometown. We had went to go get pizza when we saw lightening towards Gadsden. So we hurried to the pizza place and back. We had just sat down to watch Cheetah Girls and eat when the sirens went off. Everyone that knows me knows I hate the sirens and they give me anxiety. So we grab our dogs and go downstairs to my bottom neighbor's apartment. We had just walked in when the power went out. That is where everything starts to go dark.

We sat in the living room listening to the siren. We waited about 10 to 15 minutes after they had went off before we moved. We decided to go back to my friend's third story apartment and hang out there. As we were walking, the dark clouds had covered the blue sky and the thundered roared like lion. We get to her building when three girls ran out asking if we knew someone with a downstairs apartment. I told them I did. We run back to the bottom apartment and that is when the wind decided to pick up and the rain started to pour. We rush into the apartment and suddenly the sirens went off again. We ran for a closet. As me and the last person were walking into the closet, the living room windows busted open and we could hear the screaming of the wind. We hurried inside the closet and closed the door. For the next twenty minutes, we all huddled together. You could hear what sounded like a train about to hit the apartment. Our ears started to pop and feel stuffy. We heard things being knocked around. My first thought was, "I am going to die tonight." So I started praying. I prayed to God that He would protect us and everyone else in the town. I prayed that He give me another day to see my family and friends. I prayed that I would never take Him for granted ever again and I would rejoice in His name. God answered my prayers that night. My dad just called me when we were getting ready to get out and see the mess. He told me to not move a muscle because there was another one on the way. So I stayed and continued praying. Ten minutes later my dad gave me the all clear. I walked out of closet. Things just got darker.

All I saw was glass on the floor. There was water all in the floor. I walked over to the windows and tried to see outside. The lightening lit up the sky like a big flashlight. It looked like a war zone. Debris was everywhere. There was chunks of the roof on the ground. My mom was on the phone with me and told me to go outside the door and see the damage to my car or to see if first responders were out. After a bunch of arguing with her, I finally look outside. My car had been picked up, spun around, and dropped at the entrance of the stairway. I go back inside and not even a few minutes later someone comes knocking on the door. People had come to get us out of there because our building had been hit bad. So we rush out. I was scared for my life out in the wind and rain. We all group up at the basketball court behind our building. Looking all around me all I saw was debris and parts of building. It made me sick to think that it could have moved over just a tiny bit and hit the closet we were in. The third floor on my building and another were just stripped away. My heart started to break. We find shelter in a building that did not have damage to it except for a few window out and shingles off the roof. That is when we started waiting for rescue.

We waited almost a hour before someone finally came to escort us to safety. As we were walking out of the complex. All I saw was broken hearts, memories thrown around, and people with no place to stay. I saw my home destroyed. My home. My beautiful home. The place that I had fallen in love with its beauty had been destroyed. I thanked God that I was alive and that no one was severely hurt or worse. God had a hand on all of us that night. My roommate told me a little bit after something that stuck with me. She said, "Things can be replaced, but your life cannot." I may cry over the fact that I lost my car and that I only had the clothes on my back, but I also cry tears of joy because God protected me. I am so thankful for my roommates, my coworkers, and my JSU family. Words cannot express the love I felt after this whole thing. There are going to be times where I cannot even listen to a train without having a slight panic attack. There are things that are going to make me jumpy. But I have my family and friends to help me through.

Jacksonville State is my home. My paradise. My sanctuary. I will be returning back there because nothing is better than being a Jacksonville Gamecock. Jacksonville will forever hold a place in my heart. I will forever bleed red and white. We are JSU Strong.