THE PATH OF THE TORNADO: SPRINGFIELD TO WILBRAHAM TO MONSON TO BRIMFIELD

Yesterday we went back to try to make sense of the devastation.  We drove down Tinkham Road in Wilbraham and saw massive trees downed within inches of the houses they once shaded.  Going North, we drove past the Merrick Farm stand on Main Street; again massive trees uprooted surrounding the vegetable stand which remained unscathed for the summer's harvest.  We were not allowed to drive up Tinkham Road from Main Street so we went on, driving up Main Street and then south on Monson Road to the top of the mountain, past Peak Road (at the end of which sits our mountain of rubble, our cabinless land, our devastation), and on down Monson Road towards Monson; the houses on both sides of the road were unscathed, only a few trees down.  We took a right (going south) on Glendale Road, past the 'Road Closed' signs, to try to make sense of this tornado's path.  About 1/4 mile in, we could see, looking westward up the mountain, the path of trees downed, as the tornado made its way Eastward.  We slowed in order to inch our way past the National Grid trucks and the huge vehicles carrying tree removal equipment.  The houses to our right and our left were intact, surrounded by massive trees which had fallen around them, missing the houses by an angel's wing.  The folks, in a daze, were piling branches along the side of the road, the piles now approaching the height of their houses.  We turned around and, taking a right, continued up Monson Road towards Monson; again no damage to the houses along Monson Road.  But we knew of damage, of the damage we could not see. Calling our friend Jerry Ferrendino, who used to cut our lawn, cell phone to cell phone, to tell him there was no need to come, that the lawn was covered with downed trees, and there was no longer a cabin, he told us that he too had no house, that all the houses on his side of Wade Road, in a direct line with our cabin on top of the mountain, were gone. 

We did not enter the town of Monson to see the devastation. We did not want to; we did not have to. We had seen the front page of the Boston Globe. We had heard from Jerry Ferrendino. We had heard from the National Grid man whose offices are in Monson.  The steeple of the church, gone; the original library building damaged, the roof of Adams Grocery, blown off.  Houses flattened. We did not want to join the sightseers; we were not sightseers.  We were one of the dazed victims of this unnamed tornado.