I Survived the Quake of 2010!!!

Last week, at approximately 5:04 am, I awoke inside of a steel drum. Except what I heard and felt was not the gentle ringing rhythms of breezy calypso, but the violent trill of a cavernous rocking. Though weary from my slumber, several thoughts flew through my head within seconds, including:

1. That a plane had landed in my front yard.

2. That my elderly parents had decided to tear down a load-bearing wall for the fun of it.

3. That an atomic bomb had been dropped downtown and what I felt was the sonic shock wave. I had this image of leaving my front door and seeing desolation all around me, though somehow my house remained standing. Of course, my neighbors turned into mutant zombies so I had to fight them off, which was a whole other nightmare.

4. That an earthquake had struck.

I quickly dismissed this as ridiculous, as at 5:04 am thoughts 2 and 3 seemed more reasonable. Of course, part of me hoped for 1 and 4 (not really 3) because I totally could have gotten out of work for that. I must have fallen back asleep quite quickly, as before I knew it, my alarm rang 7am and it was time for me to get up and start my day. I wearily climbed out of my bed, feeling strange but not sure why. I left my house 30 minutes later, still unsure sure of the source of my uneasiness. While waiting for the bus, my neighbor Susan asked, “did you feel it?” I looked at her confused. “Feel what?” I responded. “The earthquake, it was on the news!” she answered. Suddenly it all came rushing back. When I woke up to get ready for work, I had completely forgotten about my previous 5:04 wake up call, and chalked up my disquiet to bad dreams. “Heard about it?!” I told Susan excitedly, “I FELT it!” For the rest of the day, I read others’ accounts and talked about it with my friends at lunch excitedly.

The next evening I spoke with my good friend Meredith, who recently moved back to California. I asked if she had heard about the earthquake and she said yes. I regaled her with my adventures, telling her it was pretty scary, and at a magnitude of 3.7, nothing to shake a stick at. “3.7?” she repeated, “how cute.”