An encounter with Cosme

Cosme was a severe tropical storm that hit Northern Luzon, right where I was. We lost power and water. Later, we also lost cellphone signal.

We were going to bring my grandmother home from the hospital but it didn't look like we would be able to with the rain.

The previous day, I had sent my nephews to buy a pack of cards so we would have something to do, so we played cards during the storm. But we noticed my cousin-in-law was nailing down a tarp over the windows on the southern side of the house, so I went out to hold up the tarp while he hammered.

The rain water felt so good. Even the strong winds felt good. The last time I purposely got wet with rain, I was still a child.

When I came back into the house soaking wet, my aunt, who always sees the silver lining in every situation, remembered that children were usually sent out to play in the first rain of May for good luck. Well, let's hope I get a lot of that good luck, since it was a big storm. I changed into dry clothes and continued to play cards with my nephews.

The next day, we went out to look at the storm's aftermath. There were a lot of overturned trees on the road. Some houses lost their roofs. As I walked around the town taking pictures with my EOS, people were directing me to the houses that were badly damaged. They assumed I was from the press.

Afterwards, I headed back and helped Obet clear the broken branches in Auntie Eying's yard.