Ringgold.

This will mostly be a picture post- but needs some explanation. We went to Tennessee and stayed at the house up there for our anniversary weekend back in July. William found out that this guy that he used to work with was doing a benefit concert up in Ringgold on the way up to Tennessee and opening for Josh Turner all the proceeds from the tickets went to Ringgold High School Band since they lost pretty much everything. We thought this would be fun since it was on the way, Josh Turner sings our "song" and we could support the guy that he worked with. Long story short, we get up there, park in a huge cow pasture and it pours. Like I am talking pours like you have never seen before and we waited for a couple hours then left. I don't think he even played. We go to the car (in calf/knee deep mud- remember we are in a cow pasture) and people who have left before us are stuck in the mud trying to get out. But, we see that there is a tractor pulling people so we think there is hope, and we are very close to a road that leads out. We are feeling slightly optimistic (once we get to the car because I am feeling like I am going to get hit by a car / truck because they have to rev up the engine and gun it to get anywhere so there is mud slinging and trucks flying everywhere!). And, I was falling everywhere every other step in the knee deep mud. Well, we finally get to the car, still raining. we change though (because we are covered in mud). We back out to go towards the road we are like 3 cars from and we get about 3 inches before we get stuck too. Well, we see there are 2 tractors and we try to flag them down. One passes and never comes back. Then there are mud children. I think they were part of the band kids that were there helping out. Well, they would get like 6 or so of them together and push cars to the road. We waited like 2 hours on a tractor or mud children and finally the mud children got to us (we are on empty at this point) and my battery dies! SERIOUSLY!!! And, I may add that I am close to an anxiety attack at this point because it was a feeling of serious stuck-ness. And, no one could help. It was beyond funny or amusing at this point. And no one would take money. The mud children were strictly told to not take money, so we could not even bribe them for us to get help. Well, someone jumped us off, luckily I had jumper cables in the trunk under all of our stuff that was packed. Then, the mud children were gone but we finally got them back and used about all the gas I had left to get my car unstuck. The pictures are from the devastation in Ringgold. Keep in mind, this is about 3 months AFTER all the tornadoes went thorough. Almost ALL of the houses had tarp on the tops and debris somewhere. It was tough to see it but it put our own lives in perspective.

 This is the field where our car got stuck... 4 days later after having time to dry!

 See the rows of mud where the cars were parked?

 Houses that were searched ... I thought this was only done in movies. William said they didnt find anyone... that is good!

 If you look over the green trees on the mountain, all the trees are down.

 There is a brown spot on the ground, there was a house there.

I am guessing this was a laundry mat? there are washers and dryers.