That was an unsettling situation (long).

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Okay, here’s the story. I am mortally afraid of tornadoes. I can not adequately express how much they scare me. If I see one on TV before I go to bed I find it very hard to fall alseep. I dream about them with disturbing regularity and if I ever saw one IRL I would probably drop dead of fright. Exposition: we live in a building containing four apartments, two on the top floor and two on the bottom. We live on the top floor, and the apartment across from us is empty. On the bottom floor live an elderly woman in one apartment and an approaching-middle-age single man in the other. The guy rarely has seems to have vistors and works at night. We know his name and nothing else.

So here I am, all by myself as the parents have gone on vacation, when the TV starts beeping and shreiks that there is a tornado warning. I turn to the local weather channel and there is a rather, shall we say, animated young man going on about trees being uprooted and telling me to take shelter immediately. According to the Doppler thingie, this tornado is heading right for my area. They show a street-level map with a very frightening red blotch about two streets away from me. My heart is pounding very fast and I’m trying to stay calm (I have panic disorder and this is um, not helping). Obviously I should try and get downstairs to a more structurally sound area and this news guy is making it sound like disaster is only a few seconds away. So I leave my apartment, go downstairs and knock on the old lady’s door. There is no answer and I realize that her kids picked her up a while ago. She’s not there. That leaves me one other option, so, very, very hesitatingly I knock on the other neighbor’s door. Remember, I barely know this person but I am fucking terrified.

I hear some rumbling sounds on the other side of the door and then Neighbor Guy yells, “Who’s there? What do you want?”
Me: “Can I hide in your bathroom from the tornado?”
NG: “What tornado?”
Me:“Ummm, did I wake you up? I’m sorry. There’s a tornado heading torward us at 35 mph.”
NG: “Where are your parents?”
Stupid Fucking Me: “In Florida.”
NG: “Let me put my robe on.”

So I step into his very dimly lit apartment. He turns on the local weather channel and now they aren’t saying a frigging thing about the tornado, just babbling about how it’s partly cloudy with a light breeze (!?!). The guy starts asking when (exactly) my parents will be back and if I have a boyfriend. He says I should have one, see, 'cause I’m like, pretty. He also offers me a nice alcoholic beverage. He asks my age and seemed surprised when I tell him that no, I am not a teenager. This on top of already being afraid just skeeves me the hell out. I would leave but the assholes on the TV have finally decided to get back to business and are telling us that the tornado is currently about, oh, 5 miles away from us. So, I sit there trying to be cool until they finally say that the storm has passed us. Then I thank the man for his hospitality, apologize for waking him and beat a very hasty exit. As I type this I’m in my place upstairs and according to the news, there was indeed a tornado, it touched down more than once in my city and caused at this point and indeterminate amount of damage. They don’t know right now if any people are hurt are killed. The storm is in another state now and I’m not really scared anymore but I’ll have a hell of a time trying to sleep tonight, for a variety of reasons. For one thing I narrowly missed coming face to face with my worst fear. Secondly, as a woman I can’t help recognizing that I could have been in a bad situation, alone in that guy’s apartment.

So my beloved and trusted Dopers, I put it to you. Am I a hysterical, overreacting little girl for being so afraid of the storm? Am I a potential dream victim with nary a brain in her skull? Am I a big meany for being so unwary about my neighbor? What the hell, if anything, should I have done differently?

2

No, you’re not hysterical. They are VERY dangerous. I grew up in the middle of Tornado Alley (Norman, OK), so I’m kind of used to them, but I still take them seriously.

If it happens again, just tell the neighbor that you called your parents and they told you to go ask him for assistance. That should help keep him in line.

3

The safest place from a tornado is not the apartment of a total stranger.

4

I am going to print that out, blow it up, and place it over my headboard.

5

Well, they CAN kill you, so you have a reason to be wary. I’ve been through one with no ill effects. They fascinate me while frightening me. I dream about chasing them once in a while and followed a suspicious cloud for a while IRL, but I also know the roads in that area intimately so I knew all of my exits if a tornado did develop.

But yes, brand Chas’s words on your brain. What you did sounded like a much better way to get hurt or killed than if you had stayed put or hidden under your bed.

6

I don’t really think you did anything wrong. You did what you thought was best, and who knows? The guy could have been a priest or Jay Leno, for all you knew before this night. Unfortunately he turned out to be a little weird. Oh well. You made a decision, and that’s what counts, I think. If you’d stayed where you were, and gotten killed, people would have said, “Now, why didn’t she go somewhere safer?”

Be happy things turned out well, and don’t go back to that weirdo’s place.

7

Myrnalene, if I were you I would consider moving to an apartment complex that at least had a basement.

Hmm, that might sound a bit snarky. I’m actually serious, though; growing up in Ohio I had a similar pathological fear of tornadoes, and living in a place with a basement helped A LOT. It was just nice to know that if one ever did hit, I had somewhere safe to go. If I still lived there, I would not live in a place without a basement. It just wouldn’t be worth the mental trauma.

8

I want to say a few words in defense of “weird neighbor”.

There he is, sitting in his skivvies in his darkened room when suddenly there’s a knock on the door. He opens it to find Myrna a young and very pretty woman who tells him: Kind sir, I’m all alone. My parents are gone and there’s a big storm coming! Can I lay in your bathtub?

You gotta believe the first thought that came into his head was Bow-chicka wah-wah!

9

It wasn’t after I started reading the replies that I realized the OP by Myrnalene said tornadoes not tomatoes.

I’m sitting here trying to figure out why someone would be so afraid of tomatoes. I guess it’s time to go to bed.