PENALTY SHOTS: Mournful sadness of a cloudless sky
A 61-year-old cancelled Perryville check found in Du Quoin; a City of Perryville trash can lid recovered in Campbell Hill; an untouched china cabinet in Elkville while the surrounding house is destroyed.
Every so often, we are reminded of the destructive force of nature and the cloudless sky in Elkville last Thursday revealed it all.
Hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, each has its own way of dismantling the creations humanity has erected in their path.
Last week's storms offered an example of how far we've come and how far we still need to go toward diminishing the effects of severe weather.
Like any natural disaster, there are stories of loss and hope, close calls and near misses. Tales of humanity coming together to help the affected.
People love to see and read these stories. I've found they serve as an inspiration to make a difference in the world around us.
Situations like last week also remind us that we are mortal and there are forces greater than what we can comprehend.
Such was the story of Tori Beaty, Billie Jo Sroka and Sroka's 9-year-old daughter. The group came face-to-face with the tornado in Vergennes while on their way home to Pinckneyville from a meeting in Murphysboro.
As Travis Lott of the County Journal reported last week, the three women witnessed the twister move a two-story house off of its foundation and set it - apparently intact - on the road.
The house fell shortly afterward, but the notion of such a structure being moved, en masse, in such a way is a remarkable feat of science.
There are other stories of tornado feats out there. I personally remember one in which a farmer had a 100-year-old peach tree in his yard.
A particularly intense tornado came along, uprooted it, moved it across the road, replanted it and the tree still lived.
True story.
If you look at recent history, Yazoo City, Miss. (2010), Joplin, Mo. (2011), Brookport, Ill. (2013), they are all tornado-ravaged towns that will forever be associated with the storm that made them famous.
Judging by the amount of media attention, it seems like hard-hit Perryville could be the next city in the line and the twister has an unofficial name - the "Fat Tuesday" tornado, which gives it a Mardi Gras connection.
Last Wednesday, as volunteers arrived to help clean up, a Perryville resident placed an American flag in a tree.
That has unofficially become a symbol of hope in any town that has become a tornado victim - Old Glory waving over the remains as a defiant example of "We shall overcome."
During the coming weeks and months, the affected residents of Perryville, Rockwood, Ava, Vergennes and Elkville will have some important decisions to make: Do we rebuild? Do we move?
A lot of that, I'm sure, comes down to financial resources. Home insurance can be expensive and natural disaster claims - especially in cases of total loss - can be an extensive process.
Speaking to my own personal experience in covering these types of stories, those who can rebuild (generally speaking) usually do. Those who cannot, move on.
What is clear to me is, for the most part, people heeded the warnings. The lone death, 24-year-old Perryville resident Travis M. Koenig, was killed on Interstate 55 when the pickup he was driving was tossed by the tornado.
Koenig was ejected into a field 100 yards from the interstate and was pronounced dead on scene. His passenger suffered minor injuries and was treated and released.
Ten other individuals in Perryville were reportedly injured by the storms. The Jackson County Sheriff's Department reported four county residents were treated and released from local hospitals after suffering minor injuries caused by flying debris.
That is remarkable considering 46 residences in Jackson County are reported to have suffered storm damage - 12 are a total loss.
So the next time you think a storm watch or warning is "no big deal," remember days like Feb. 28. One thing I've found about these types of weather-related events is you always think they will happen to someone else.
Then you become "someone else."