| After a tornado struck Windsor last week, some may think Kendra Hammond has a direct link to Mother Nature.
Hammond, however, just thinks she was one of the lucky ones.
And that's after losing her home to a mile-wide tornado that ripped up the town in just a few minutes.
Hammond, 29, should have spent the past weekend preparing for the biggest day of her life when she will marry Sam Martin June 7 at Main Park in Windsor. Instead, she was right along with several hundred other Windsor residents trying to get a glimpse of a home she has only memories of now.
Hammond's home at the corner of Cornerstone Drive and Slate Court was a total loss. But the gazebo she planned to use for her wedding ceremony is still standing, and her wedding dress was late, so it too is safe.
"Somebody was looking out for me," said Hammond, a 1997 Windsor High School graduate.
And the wedding is on. If it weren't obvious driving around town that something was terribly wrong, Hammond, who is the recreation coordinator for the Windsor Parks and Recreation Department, would never show it. She's not sweating the small stuff. And she never even thought about canceling the wedding until people started asking about it.
"I was like, 'Yeah, I'm still having my wedding,' " she said with a laugh. "He's not getting out of it that easy. I told Sam I didn't care if we had to walk over trees, we were getting married at Main Park. We would do whatever we had to do, if people had to sit on them."
Hammond grew up in Windsor, and Main Park was always a special place for her. It was the heart of Windsor with all the big, old trees. It was the only place she wanted for the backdrop as she began her life with Martin, 30.
Nothing has changed.
"The gazebo is beautiful," she said. "I don't know how because tons of trees fell around it -- but it's still there. It's awesome."
Hammond, who ran out to Chimney Park after the storm cleared to check on recreation employees, first found out about her home from a co-worker, Tara Fotsch.
"I got a call from Tara saying, 'Well, I have your dog and your fianc¨¦. They are both fine, but your house is not.' And I go, 'OK,' But I was like, 'What am I going to do about it at this point?' So I went back out and tried to help the community as much as I could."
It wasn't until Martin showed her pictures he took immediately after the storm that the magnitude of the tornado set in.
Her kitchen was destroyed, her garage was gone and the bridal shower gifts she received just a couple of weeks earlier were broken.
But her humor remained.
"When it comes to my stuff, it's ruined," she said. "But stuff is stuff. I told Sam, 'It will make me downgrade.' I don't have as much stuff now. I can de-clutter. I don't even remember what was (in the garage) because it was just wiped clean."
During the first phase of the cleanup Saturday, she was reminded of what's important in her life.
"I learned how incredible our community is," she said. "We had people I don't even know carrying boxes of stuff to our trailer trying to get things out of there as fast as possible. And little kids came up who had made chocolate chip cookies. I was just like, 'In a time like this, all I wanted was a cookie.' It was awesome."
Perhaps more awesome, though, was the first wedding present she received from Federal Express on Saturday.
"It was a SpotBot (Deep Cleaner)," she said laughing -- still. "I was like, 'OK Sam, get to cleaning.' "
Article Sources:http://www.greeleytrib.com/article/20080530/NEWS/932699715/-1/rss02
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