The Great Flood of 2011

OK, the Great Flood is a little extreme...it was a flood!  In Oklahoma any amount of ice can shut the state down, but add over ten inches of snow and we have problems.  Add Oklahoma wind (you know, Oklahoma, where the wind comes sweepin' down the plain) and you really have problems.  That is what started the Great Flood of 2011.  It was the snow's fault...or at least partly.  I teach school in a small community that has grown faster than planned.  So last year when our oldest elementary building was torn down, several of us were "misplaced" while the school built a new building.  I was "misplaced" into a small room off of the combination cafeteria/gym.  On the best of days, the room is noisy from the shared space---and oh, please don't talk about the garlic and onion days!  But getting back to the storm... this year the snow storm was worse than in years past for several reasons, the late date of it, the 19 inches of snow it left in some parts of the state, and of course, the lack of the government for being prepared.  How does a flood enter into the picture?  Easily, with snow this deep, there is not school.  And no school means that there are not any staff to find frozen pipes.  And you guessed it, the pipes over my classroom froze.  Luckily for me, our janitor staff were called in and found the leak shortly after it was started...unluckily for me and for them, the leak had already dropped over 500 gallons of water into my room.  That is how the Great Flood of 2011 happened. 

But here is the rest of the story...school still has to go on.  Children still need to learn.  And in order to make that happen, the janitorial staff, my husband, my children, and I worked together to get everything cleaned up and ready to go.  The leak was found Thursday morning.   By Sunday at noon, my room was ready for students.  The floors were dry, the furniture was in place, the mess was gone, and the smell was getting under control.  My beautiful room looks even better.  Yes, I lost supplies...but nothing I can't teach without.  Yes, I will be finding items that need to be replaced for months to come, but that doesn't change what I can do with a book and me.  Those items will not effect what and how my students learn.  They really won't change the way I teach.  The Great Flood of 2011 had no impact on my T-1 class.  We had a perfectly great Monday and it won't slow us down.