Like most of you know, I moved from Maine to Tennessee almost four years ago.

With a lot of changes, comes changes in the weather. I need the sun, and the sun needs me. Winters that can sometimes last six months were becoming too much, and the South has more to offer than six month long winters. But, that doesn't mean I wasn't prepared for some of the weirdest weather imagineable.

Tennessee, aside from being my happy place, is completely bi-polar weather. Snows one day, is sixty degrees the next, and any trace of snow is absolutely gone. But, of course, school has been let out due to the fact no one down here knows how to drive in it. But the one thing that was a massive change was the fact that I traded in Nor'Easters for Tornadoes.

The first tornado watch I ever experienced was the biggest anxiety attack of my life. M was at school, J&S at work, and I was home alone with the animals. I noticed how dark the sky was for 9 a.m., and I absolutely thought we were going to experience the apocalypse. I had googled videos of tornadoes, kept the news on and looked up every single precaution to take. After I picked M up at school and came home, we did end up having to take cover in S's closet (her closet is the inside wall, the safest spot if you don't have a storm shelter and/or basement.) Me, M, J, S, and four animals in a small closet. How lovely. At least we're family, right?

We ended up coming out when the Weatherman said we were out of the warning, and my anxiety had subsided. Throughout the rest of that year, there wasn't another watch/warning for our county.

Then, the next tornado season started.

This time, I was ready to chase them. I had found a fascination, to the point where we would be in a watch, and I'd see the wind pick up outside and I would go out to the back porch and watch the clouds form. Mind you, where I live, Tornadoes normally cannot stay long enough because of how hilly it is. But, I was ready to jump in my car and chase the tornadoes, wherever they go. I wanted it to be just like the movie, Twister.

I'll see people back home on Facebook complain about all the nasty storms of snow that were coming through, and I laugh because now I have to deal with Tor-Con and F1-F5 tornadoes, taking cover in shelters and seeing on the news a mobile home has been lifted out of it's lot. As scary as they are in the beginning, I have learned to love the weather that is Tennessee. I have officially traded in Nor'Easters for Tornadoes.