Whole Lotta Shakin’

For the uninitiated, coastal BC sits in an earthquake zone. A couple of continental plates are jammed one atop the other and one day a shift is going to occur that will make Abbostford a waterfront city. We’re located on the east side of the Pacific “Rim of Fire”, a volcanic and geologically unstable circle that may be likened to a sleeping dragon: we move with the rhythm of its breathing, but we get a jolt when it coughs.

Gods help us when it wakes.

I’d still rather live here than in the prairies, where tornadoes have an annual season, or the tropics, where hurricanes/monsoons/cyclones are equally predictable. I know enough about quakes to have the infrequent, “OMG, we’re gonna die!” freak out, but such thoughts don’t stick around. If they did, I’d have relocated years ago.

I’m good with the occasional tremor.

In truth, they happen every day. We just don’t feel most of them. I’ve convinced myself that every little shaker is releasing the pressure on the subducted plates and thus delaying or reducing the oomph of the inevitable Big One, but no one knows for sure if this is so. We won’t know until it happens.

I will confess, however, that the 4.3 or 4.9, depending on who you talk to,  event that shook me awake on December 29 lasted longer than was comfortable. Just as I thought it was over, the shaking resumed with a little more vigour. “This is it,” I thought (the first time I have ever thought that), and in the next instant … nothing.

My heart took longer to quit pounding than the quake itself lasted, but time assumes a disconcerting elastic quality when Nature is in charge. Compared to others felt over the years, this one was impressive.

They are usually over before they can be identified. I once thought the photocopier was due for servicing, but an earthquake had rattled through the print run.

While prepping for work one morning years ago, the bathroom floor lurched beneath my feet. “Ter!” I yelled, continuing to apply my eye makeup, “was that a quake?”

“I think so!” she called from the other end of the house. End of conversation.

Another time, also at Rockland, I was in the tub when a large truck rumbled past the house. Ter poked her head into the bathroom to advise me otherwise. I glanced at the painting on the wall above me and thought perhaps we should move it elsewhere.

There are no paintings on the bedroom walls, just in case.

10:30 p.m. on Boxing Day 2012—I recall the specifics because the house cracked and trembled as the train roared through the basement and I thought, “No! Not during the Game of Thrones marathon!”

The Northridge, California quake in 1994 was memorable not for being felt in BC, but for the six weeks that followed, during which the office I was with answered countless calls from the public, varying from practical requests for info on what to put in an earthquake kit to panicked pleas for advice on what to do when a shaker hits. One caller was ready to pack up and return to Ontario, but my “the earth is breathing and sometimes it coughs” explanation relaxed her enough to reconsider.

“It’s not to be feared,” I said, “just prepare as best you can.”

I wonder sometimes if I was given the same advice about life before I was born.