There are so many lingering questions I have about April 27. I know most of those questions have no earthly answer. I know some of those questions I will never know the answer to. For instance, take the story about my baby shirt from the day I was born. When I was born, back in 1981, the staff at the hospital dressed me in a little pink shirt with a picture of a stork carrying a baby and the words "Life Begins at Athens Limestone Hospital". When I was in high school my mom gave that shirt to me. I kept it in a box in the top of my bedroom closet, along with a collection of other childhood memories including the birth announcement that hung on my bassinet in the hospital nursery that night. Over the years the pink shirt faded, but I held onto it knowing that someday my children would be born at Athens Hospital (because that's where my amazing doctor delivers babies). I planned to put that shirt on our children (if they were girls) when they were born.
Then April 27 happened, and it turned my world upside down. My little pink shirt, which now resided in that same box but in the hall closet to my new home, disappeared. In fact the whole box disappeared. I did manage to find a few things from that box, but not the little pink shirt. I accepted, sadly, that it was gone and my children would never wear that shirt - just another punch in the gut from the tornado that had already taken everything but my life, my family, and my faith.
Weeks passed. We were all over that property - no sign of that little pink shirt. Then one day when I stopped by to wander aimlessly around the yard looking for anything that I might not have found before, which I often did, I walked up the steps onto the foundation and there sat that little pink, faded Athens Hospital shirt - just like someone had spread it out on that foundation waiting for me. And just shy of the one year anniversary of the storm, I did get to dress our daughter in that shirt - the little girl who wasn't even on the way when that shirt mysteriously showed back up.
My lingering questions there are: 1) Who found the shirt? 2) Where did they find the shirt? 3) How did they know which house it belonged to?
Questions that will never be answered.
Now the bigger mystery for me is one that I thought I knew the answer to. For anyone who's read my account of that day, you may remember that the very last thing I heard before the tornado hit was someone saying "This is the one that can kill people". I always assumed that came from Channel 48 because I had the TV turned up loud enough to hear it in the closet and that was the only thing in the house making any noise. The weather radio was next to me, but when it alarms I always listen to it, and then turn it back off until it alarms again. It wasn't on. So, I was the only one in the house, and the news was the only thing talking. Logically I assumed it was someone on there who made that comment. It always bothered me because that comment is what put absolute terror in me literally seconds before the tornado was on top of me. I thought it was strange for someone to make that comment, but I also know that when you're in that moment sometimes you say things without even thinking about it. I assumed that's what happened.
It bothered me though. Every few months since the storm I'd search the internet and look for video of Channel 48's broadcast that day. I wanted to prove to myself that they really said that. I've seen a few videos on Youtube, but I could tell that they were edited - jumping ahead in time to track certain storms. Over 16 months later I still couldn't let that go. I still searched for video. Then a few days ago I found it. I found the video I'd been looking for - an unedited version of the broadcast from April 27. Only it brought more questions than answers.
I did hear them talk about seeing the tornado on Alfa cam and their voices getting a little more excited, worried, when they actually saw it. The broadcast kept going, but no one made the comment about this tornado being the one that could kill people. I now have my answer. Channel 48 didn't make that comment. But I heard it. Which changes the question from "did the news really say that?" to "Since they didn't say it, then who did?". I now have a new lingering question to add to my list:
Who was the voice in the closet that afternoon?
