Ten years after the night the sky fell.
I’ve gotten a number of e-mails, and even a call from a reporter, in the past week, all related to the 1996 Fort Smith Tornado Journal that I wrote in the pre-blog version of Scribblings almost exactly ten years ago. (I only just realized that I hadn’t ported this rather lengthy article over to the new, more bloggish portion of Scribblings, so I’ve done just that as of last night.) Generally, everyone’s been upbeat about it, glad that there’s some document on the web from someone who was there when it happened, and I’m glad they like it. In its own way, it’s a document of a time and a place and a mindset, and so I guess that since it’s a document of my mindset at a juncture that was less than favorable for me to hang on to all of my marbles, if I’m to be honest, I’m a little bit embarrassed about it. It’s a bit “overwritten” from a stylistic standpoint, and veers a little too close to angsty emotional overload for my tastes these days. But that’s who and where I was at the time, so I’ve managed to resist my urges to edit it or rewrite any of it.
Anyway, thanks to everyone who’s been reading it and letting me know.… Read more
