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“We have water oaks with shallow root systems. Any gust of wind can take them down.”

On Saturday, lots of homes around Lafayette saw near misses of fallen tree limbs, severed branches and uprooted water oaks.

The children crouched on the limbs of a water oak that grew outside Mary Anne’s window, listened to their mother’s laughter, and tried to interpret its meaning.

Cunningham pauses our regatta to point out a barely perceptible elevation change — rod-straight loblolly pines, sweetgums and water oak are clustered on slightly higher ground while bald cypresses and tupelos are partly submerged.

A water oak fell into a corner of their house, but they didn’t care.