I don't even know where to begin with this post! Tuesday started off as any ordinary day at our house. Grant woke up, went to play basketball before work, and then went to his office. William and I headed to the library around 9am for our weekly story-time gathering. As story-time finished up around 10am, I looked outside and noticed it was snowing pretty hard, but nobody else at the library seemed to take notice or be concerned about the roads. While we were walking out, William darted off to play on one of the big kid computers and so gracefully fell and busted his nose. So, I quickly hurried to the car with him screaming bloody murder and didn't really have time to think twice about whether or not driving was a good idea.
As I was driving home, slight panic started to set in because I skidded across the bridge on Hollywood Blvd. before getting on 280 and briefly lost control of the the Tahoe. This happened several other times on 280 before I turned onto Overton. I got to the very top of Overton and quickly realized it was going to be a lonnnngggg trek home! Several cars had already skidded off the road and began hitting each other and were "stuck" (aka I was terrified to go any further!). I watched the man in front of me slide down and hit another car. Then the policeman who arrived at the scene came up to my window, and I quickly proclaimed, "I'm not moving. I have a baby in the car" to which he quickly replied, "then call 911 and get them to take you home." He said this in a very serious voice but he had to be joking, right?! Anyway, after the policeman refused to move my car for me, I realized I had to be a big girl and figure it out on my own. With God's grace, I managed to cross the hilly part of Overton on a side street and skid to the bottom of a hill (literally). By this point, everyone was colliding into one another, so I again pulled over on the side of the road and decided I wasn't moving.
After sitting on the side of the road for about an hour watching cars skid down a steep hill, a man came up to my window and asked if I was okay. I quickly told him I was freaked out about driving down the hill and asked if he could get my car to the bottom of the street and then I'd go from there. So as he was driving me down the hill, I asked if he lived nearby by. He quickly figured where I was going with this and invited me to come to his house, but FIRST he had to get his car down the steep hill. He then walked back up the hill in the freezing cold to retrieve his car and get it to the bottom of the hill. This process took about 45 minutes. Thankfully I had a box of wheat thins in the car, and William pretty much ate the entire box. I, on the other hand, snacked on stale pecans that were still in the back of the Tahoe from Christmas :)
When the man got down the hill, William and I hopped in his car and headed up another very steep hill to get to his house. When we arrived at his gorgeous house, his wife greeted us at the door with hot banana bread and milk. Their high-school daughter was still driving around in the elements trying to make her way home. Thankfully, William was on his best behavior and relatively calm in the beautiful mansion :) When the teenage daughter got home a couple of hours later, William quickly took to her and she entertained him in their basement while I tried to track Grant down.
In the meantime, Grant had made it to Lakeshore near Brookwood Mall and 280 had completely shut down by this point. Therefore, he decided to WALK to me and William. About an hour later, Grant showed up at the house frozen solid. It was close to 3:30 by this point. Around 4pm, the man of the house decided he would attempt to drive us home in his SUV that had 4-wheel drive. So we all loaded up with him and slowly inched our way home. It was hands down one of the craziest days of my life.
Since Tuesday, I haven't been able to stop thinking about the generosity and kindness of the family that took us in. I can't wait to share this story with William one day when he can understand. The entire city of Birmingham was pretty much shut down from Tues. - Fri. All schools and daycares were cancelled, which meant I was at home with William for 4 long days pretty much stuck inside. We made the best of it though and we'll never forget "Snowmageddon" in January of 2014.
