Science Malfunction

Yesterday my parents said there is no reason for me to share everything that goes on in my little mind. And let's face it, when my parents are ambiguously suggesting that maybe I should keep something to myself, that means it's either highly controversial or terribly embarrassing (they support my utter use of free speech with abandon, so if they dissuade me it is only because they are worried I will be hurt by people's responses... like those last week who called my faith that of a care bear?!). When they step in, you know it's bad. 

But I have gone against the better judgement and wisdom of my parents to bring you this story. After much thought and wise counsel from my pillow, I decided to go ahead and share it with you because honestly, I am still traumatized.   

And it begins...

Ryan and I decided to sleep with the TV on Sunday night tuned into the CNN coverage of hurricane Gustav. We have friends and family all along the gulf coast and wanted to be able to wake up at any moment and know what was going on and how they were doing (OK, and honestly, we are suckers for continuous breaking news with Wolf Blitzer). 

For an hour we sat there staring at the screen watching goofy news reporters being blown away by the wind and marveling at the amazing Cajun accents. We saw the same weather map with its enormous "football field" size storm swirling around and yelled at the people on the screen who were not leaving,"Get out of the city lady! Bring your cat! Go!"  

Before dozing off to sleep I asked a perfectly legitimate question. 

Ryan, "When the big football field black hole is swooshing around in the ocean and the sea opens up, where do the fish go?"

There was complete silence. So I kept talking. 

"I mean, it's basically an inverted tornado that is in the water, so do the fish get sucked in? How deep is the hole? Maybe they are far below the hole? Do they just know to swim around it?"

Silence. 

Then the bed starts to shake and Ryan begins laughing a laugh that literally goes on for five minutes straight. He is crying by the end of it. I am laughing too, but I have no idea why. What's so funny about the fish being sucked into the center of the storm?

"Hurricanes are in the sky," he says. 

This is the biggest lie I have ever heard. 

In the sky? They are clearly in the ocean. Every picture on TV shows that big blob of swirling water in the ocean with a hole in the middle of it. It moves in the water and makes the waves high and violent. It makes the clouds angry because the water is too hot or something so they start sucking water up and making rain clouds and tornadoes. And the wind, I am not sure how it comes out of the ocean, I had not thought that far into it until Sunday night, but I am sure the wind is a by-product of the actual body of water and the tornado that is inside of it. 

Ryan cannot stop laughing and for a brief, bewildered moment I wonder if there is any way he can be right? Hurricanes in the sky? Really? What part of third grade did I not understand? Could this really be true? And I am just now finding out before my 28th year on this earth? 

My mind was reeling. The idea of a hurricane being in the sky had never occurred to me, ever. And it was soooo off and wrong. Hurricanes are born in the waves and deep down in the ocean. The storm is in the ocean, and then when the ocean ends, the storm blows onto the land. I don't know. I just know it's in a freakin body of water.

My brain hurt. I dreamed about hurr-nados all night. I felt totally cheated of a proper education and way more embarrassed than when I discovered Santa wasn't real in the 9th grade. I called my parents the next morning and made them both get on the phone. They thought I was going to tell them I was pregnant. And I just wanted an explanation. Someone please, tell me how I am just finding out that a hurricane is in the sky. 

Dad said I had other gifts. But what, not the gift of intelligence? Mom said I was a visual learner so it made since that I internalized the images as literal. Ryan just shook his head, laughed, and asked, "I mean seriously, did you never give it a second thought?" And I went straight to the computer to find out what Mr. Wizard said about it all. 

I found this diagram. 

I was crushed. My knowledge epicenter is in a tizzy now. It is hard for me to wrap my brain around the fact that every time I see a hurricane now, it is not in the ocean, but in the sky like a tornado. Might as well say that the lava from a volcano rains down from the sky. I am at loss.

Such is life... at least I learned something new today, right?