When I was 19 years old, I was sitting in my dorm room in North Carolina and the floor shook slightly. I assumed someone was running along the wooden balcony on the other side of the wall. I gave it no further thought until the next day, when I heard on the radio that we had had a minor earthquake. That is the extent of my earthquake experience.
Now I am in the Pacific Northwest, and I’ve been told by more than one person that we are overdue for a big one. One guy even said, “Always have a pair of comfortable shoes on hand, because if it happens, all the bridges will collapse and you’ll have to walk out of the city.”
First of all, I work on a bridge, so if it collapses, walking out of the city will probably be the least of my worries. Second, all the bridges around here have been retrofitted to withstand fairly powerful quakes. And third, if all the bridges are down, where, exactly, do you plan to walk?
I think one of the things I’ll have to get used to in this part of the world is the underlying fact that nature can kick your ass any time it wants to. I mean, in Florida we had hurricanes, but there’s plenty of warning for those. I suppose there was potential for a rogue tsunami or something. But here you know an earthquake is going to happen. You just don’t know when. And when it does, all you can do is stop, drop, and cover, and hope you survive to use your emergency supplies.
It’s a weird concept that the ground beneath your feet, which you have always counted on to be solid, can move and even liquify in extreme cases. That’s got to play with your head. I wonder how I’ll react.
And I hate the idea that when the time comes my dogs will have to fend for themselves. They’ll be terrified and confused. But there’s nothing I’ll be able to do about that until the earth goes back to sleep. At least temporarily.
[Image credit: news.bbc.co.uk]
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