At the end of July we hosted a party for my daughter who had graduated from high school back in May. It was a HOT and HUMID July afternoon, pretty par for the course for summer in the Midwest. I had decided that I was going to cater it all and not worry about a thing. It has been a stressful year and even harder summer, with lots going on in our family and little time to worry about the details of a backyard event. However, I did want to pull off a great party for my daughter who has worked so hard to get where she is and deserved a day of attention and celebration.

Lucky for me, Ted worked nonstop to get the yard ready. If you know us, you know we have a large backyard with a decent sized swamp wetland taking up a corner of it. There are random groundhog/skunk/raccoon holes all over it. Add a swing set, multiple trees, and a huge slope leading from the street level to the lower-level walkout basement, and he had a lot of work to do. Also lucky for me, I have a sister who came into town a day early to help with the indoor work. (Not lucky for me: A dog that has had extensive gastrointestinal issues which results in steaming cow pies in our yard and frequent sulfurous gas emissions.)

The day of the party we were in pretty good shape. That morning, we woke up at 8am to get the final decorations on the tent before the party started at 2pm. It was a steamy and hot already. (For the record, I am terrible in the heat. I sweat like a sumo wrestler in a sauna.) Franny, my sister Melissa, and I began by carefully moving the rented tables and chairs onto level ground to avoid the large divots in the yard. We gently placed the royal blue fancy tablecloths on the tables and made sure they hung evenly all around. Ted and his brother had strung outdoor lights throughout the tent. Franny assembled around 20 lanterns of different sizes and hung them evenly and symmetrically from one corner of the tent to another. Melissa spent a lot of time stringing together a banner of paper triangles to hang as bunting around the perimeter of the tent. We all worked hard as the time slipped by until around 12:30pm, when we felt we were done. We were drenched in sweat and disgusting.

We had about 45 minutes to get ready before the food arrived. Ted ran to the store to get ice and Franny ran to Target to get a last-minute item. Melissa and I went upstairs to shower. I even had time to sit on my bed after the shower and take a short break before the work began again.

Now, I realize this a long, boring build-up to my story. But you need to know the extent of the work that was done before disaster hit. And it hit fast and furiously. At 12:45pm, around an hour and 15 minutes before the guests would arrive, and after four hours of prep, Ted arrived home from getting ice to see a truck in our driveway and the tent guys packing up our tables and chairs.

Apparently, the owner “Steve” (I’m going to protect the poor guy and not use his real name), got his dates wrong. He thought pick-up was the day of my party, not the next day. The tent was halfway disassembled. The lights had been cut down and were tossed aside. The flags Melissa had so carefully strung and hung were ripped off the tent and lying crumpled on the ground. The tablecloths were in a pile in the dirt. (I really wish I had taken a picture to show you the extent of the damage, but the fury that overtook me prevented me from being calm enough to take a photo).

All I can say was I thought I was in a dream.

I don’t know how to explain what came over me, but I ran down to the yard yelling like I was possessed. It’s possible that the stress of 2026 funneled into my brain, personality, and mouth all at once and was released on that poor guy. I won’t repeat what I said, but it ended with Steve (a big, tall, burly man) sitting on a chair re-stringing those delicate flags with his beefy hands.

Side Note: I don’t know how a person could look at a tent that was strung with lights and banners and flags and lanterns and see tables covered in pristine clean tablecloths and maybe if you looked around notice that there wasn’t really any garbage laying around and not be able to deduct that maybe A PARTY HAD NOT HAPPENED YET. Why he didn’t stop short and think, “Hmm..maybe I should double check my dates,” or “Hmm..maybe I should knock on the door and ask them if they want their lights or lanterns or tablecloths before I rip them off this tent and throw them all on the ground,” I just don’t know.

We had a little over one hour to get the place set up again. Except this time, we had two very frightened tent workers helping us. I can’t comment on anything during his part of the day because I actually walked away and let the rest of my family handle it. What I can comment on with confidence, is that none of us ever really recovered from the heat. The next hour was such a rush that I started sweating again and never stopped. I did not wear what I was planning on wearing. I did not wear my hair down the way I was planning. (In fact, in the pictures from the party my hair is a disaster. Why did no one tell me?) My makeup ran off one hour in.

But in the end, it made a good story for everyone who walked through the door. “Did you hear what happened with the tent?” We all had a good laugh as it was fixed before the guests showed up and it looked nice enough that no one noticed. And as with every “I can’t believe this happened” incident with me (and they seem to happen often), mid-way through I was thinking, “This might make a good blog.” But was there enough material? Well, I shouldn’t have worried about that, because what happened the next day left me with no question.

Monday was a dark and overcast morning. It was obvious from the skies and the forecast a storm was coming. I wondered when the tent guys would come to pick up their things and was surprised they hadn’t arrived early in the day. I decided to go outside and make sure all the tables and chairs were completely underneath the tent. I was hoping to get some kind of refund for the trouble the day before, and the last thing I needed was the owner saying his tables were water-damaged and we could call it even.

At around 11:30am it started getting really dark. If you live locally, you will know that in some areas it was dark as night outside that day. Suddenly, the alerts went off loudly in unison on all the phones in our house. Tornado warning. Now, I will admit that I am lazy about tornado warnings. I don’t always take them seriously and go into the basement like I am supposed to. But this time was different. It was very windy and by now black as night. My friend Maggie was visiting, and she and Franny and I went into the basement with the dog and took shelter.

Now, mind you, I have a walk-out basement. So, even though we are “taking shelter,” there are two glass windows and a glass door that lead to the very wooded yard, so I am not sure how safe it actually is. But there we were. It was loud and windy and rain was pelting down and by the now the power was out and it was VERY dark. It was a little bit scary, and at one point I even thought I heard voices, but in a dreamy sort of way, like if you were in a horror movie and strangers show up at your door during a storm looking for shelter while running from aliens.

Except this horror movie was real life and the tent guys were outside my house. it was real life and suddenly Franny yelled, “The tent guys are outside!!”

Yes readers, the oh-so-bright tent gentlemen were back. Taking down my tent in the middle of a tornado.

I went to the door and opened it. Three grown men were wet and shivering on my back patio like stray dogs.

“THERE IS A TORNADO OUTSIDE. GET INSIDE” I ordered them. I was dumbfounded. I am sure I looked like a disappointed and confused mother. What on earth where they doing there? None of them moved. “Oh we’re okay, we’re just going to —” Steve started to say. “GET IN THE HOUSE NOW! WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?” I interrupted.

Suddenly Steve looked to his right, “TREE FALLING!” he shrieked, and the next thing you know, he and his lackeys were running into my house while a tree crashed about 10 feet from where he was standing.

I was done with this mayhem. I started barking out orders. “Come in the living room. Don’t touch anything, you are wet and dirty. Don’t sit on my couch. Who is in charge?”

Turns out Steve was the owner. He went on to explain that according to the radar they checked, the storm had passed, so they decided to head to my house to collect the tent and tables. I mean, you don’t need radar to see that it is pitch black outside and windy and rainy and that a tree just fell down next to you. But anyway, there they stood in my basement for about a half hour until they felt it was safe to pack up and leave.

Epilogue: A few days later, the weather report showed c that an actual tornado had touched down in our area. In fact, according to the map, the path of the tornado literally passed through my property. I have to believe it touched down the minute I had opened the door and the tree fell. This is because it matches the time stamp of when I snapped a pic of the Steve and his crew in my basement. (Yes, I took a picture of them. I was already concocting the blog in my head as it was happening.) Unfortunately (or fortunately for them), the power went off as soon as I clicked so the picture is dark, which might be good because I don’t want them to sue me.

I know you are all going to want to know what the rental company was so you can avoid them, but I have used them twice now and I’m not going to ruin a guy’s business because of one mistake. He rectified it immediately and gave me a partial refund and was very apologetic.

Then again, when Ted said, “I’m sure you must feel horrible. This probably never happens to you,” Steve look at him and answered, “Eh, about once a year actually.”

I can’t make this stuff up.