I live in Annawan, Illinois.

I like it here a lot; it is very small, having only 900 to 1,000 people living here. It’s the kind of small town that you would wave at a car passing by you, even if you do not know who they are. You would help your neighbor out if they had some sort of problem, or if they had a tree knocked down or something.

In July 2008, there were a series of very strong, straight line winds. They were around 70 miles per hour, and they hit Annawan. Since there are few big buildings to block the wind, they knocked several trees down and caused some damage to houses. The power was out for around two days or so. But, during that time I remember very distinctly and clearly, that I got together with several friends, and we all walked around town, helping others out by moving dead tree branches away to the streets where they would be carried off, or even cutting off limbs to the trees. Fortunately during this storm, I do not think anyone was ever hurt, and if anyone was, it was very minute.