This may read as a "tall tale" like what could have happen, and afterwards...

On the fourth Sunday in May each year we have a family gathering at the old family cemetery in southern Missouri about 1/4 mile from the Arkansas state border. Buried here are family members from the early eighteen hundreds. Also some thirty Cherokee Indians who walked the Trail of Tears. One being my great great grandmother, and great grandmother, and my grandma, and my father and mother, older brother, a score of aunts and uncles, and many cousins. The morning was spent decorating the graves, and after church services in the old church which was built in early 1860, we have a dinner on the old wooden tables out back of the church.
This tradition has been going on from what I have been told since about 1875.

About 2: p.m we left the group and headed for Kansas. The road trip takes about 4 -1/2 hours. Heading west on Interstate 44 toward Joplin, Mo.. I mentioned to the wife I would like a stop at Braum's in Joplin to get a strawberry shake. When I do this, the wife always gets her favorite ....chocolate sundae with all the goodies. We arrive at Braum's at 5:15 p.m. She wanted to stay and eat inside. I preferred to get back in the car and have our shake and sundae on the drive home. When we drove out of the Braum's parking lot, we notice the dark clouds to the northwest, and I said to the wife, that looks like a tornado forming.

We arrive home at 6:20 to find there were three phone calls from my two bothers in Springfield wanting to know if we were okay, as a tornado destroyed about half of Joplin, Mo. This morning I find the tornado destroyed the Braum's restaurant some ten minutes after we left there. It could have been our "Doomsday" if we would stayed to have our ice cream treats. My wife thanks me ever few hours for my wanting to drive home sooner.

That sounds so much like what goes on in my family, KF...we have a family cemetery on land set aside by my maternal great-grandfather. Many of my family are buried there, and every second Sunday in June, the family gathers there, decorates the graves (they're mounded up in the old-fashioned way) and, after a "dinner on the ground," there's a singing and some preaching in the old chapel that was built mainly for funerals.



What an amazing story, KF...and I too am glad you decided to continue your drive! One for the archives, no doubt, old friend...and here I was worrying about your safety in the last Kansas tornadoes! I didn't know you had been dodging them in Missouri, too! Glad you and Mrs. KF made it home, enjoying those treats all the way! I'm like Mrs. KF..I LOVE a sundae with all the trimmings, especially hot fudge./

Wow! KF. What a close call that was!

My next door neighbor has relatives in Joplin. One of them works at St. John's Medical Center. She hasn't heard anything from any of them since the tornado.

Scary.

Missouri is a RED state...I wonder if the conservative voters will now be calling for "less government" and "we don't want the government's help. We can take care of ourselves"...yeah, right. The people who have lost everything will be grateful for all the help they can get...and rightly so. Obama is supposed to visit Joplin on Sunday...on the ground rather than a flyover....

Missouri the past several elections has voted Republican, which was a Blue state up until Ronnie "shoe polish dyed hair" Reagan took office. Going deeper into the most conservative part of the state, Joplin (7th District) is real Red. Eight of ten voters here are Republican.

dori, my older brother daughter is a nurse at St. John's hospital in Joplin. She was just getting out her car in the parking lot to go to work when the tornado hit. Once inside she looked and saw her car flying end-over-end across the parking lot. She wasn't hurt from the storm.

KING FISHER...Check your private messages, please!

KF, glad your relative wasn't harmed, although seeing your car go end over end has to stick in one's mind. But then everything about Joplin sticks in one's mind.

My neighbor heard from her cousin--everyone OK, but very busy trying to bring the place back as best one can.

I wondered what color that district was. My neighbor is very RRRRR. Not surprising her relatives would be too.

I too, wondered how long it would take to have hands out for tax money. Isn't it amazing how people are totally against tax money being used for 'other people' but not for themselves? Our very own paper has a story saying we are getting a big payout from Washington for storm and drain sewers. That after saying how terrible 'other people' are for wanting Washington money for things from which only they will benefit.

Oh, yeah, and more money going into the airport--the one all the rich people use for their own private playground.

dori, one has to think why some people who has lost most everything, or near all would dislike our President for flying to Joplin, Mo to view the tornado destruction, and hold a prayer service.
That would be the case for my niece...older brother daughter who lost her car, roof was blown away, windows in her home gone, and all carpets to be replace, could not come up with a thank you President for showing up here in time of need. Instead, she sends a email to her father...who forwarded it to me... saying, "the colored dude shows up for a photo opt, and shakes a few hands, and spends more time with the richer person, no doubt asking for their votes", and cares less what has happen here." Of course, I can understand her, as her father...my brother was raised as a Republican, and he do doubt did the same to his children. But I forgive those that trespass on my political views.

Why is that? People who need help the most don't acknowledge where it comes from?

I have disowned my family. KF, you are far better than I. I got so sick of people who have no idea what they have been given, or that there is a thank you involved anywhere, I finally gave up.

Wish I had your constitution KF.