I’d been sick the entire day previous, so I thought I was hallucinating when I woke up to my room walls shaking.
It was more than a vibration; it felt like some invisible force was swaying the entire foundation of my house. Toto, we’re not in Kansas anymore.
I soon realized it couldn’t have been a dream, as I went to another room of the house and found my dog barking at seemingly nothing at all. While he does this on occasion, it usually is while he’s sitting in the window looking outside. Hence, it had to be something. But an earthquake? Don’t they typically occur in California vs. New Jersey? And even so, don’t the weather people typically predict these things?
I didn’t have the sense to turn on the news at the time, but went outside in my backyard, and luckily spoke with my neighbor who asked if I “felt the earthquake.” She said her daughter was over a friends house, and she picked her up and brought her home, “just incase.” I was simply relieved that what I experienced was indeed real.
The 5.9 magnitude earthquake, which began in Virginia an eventually flowed throughout much of the East Coast, lasted only about 30 seconds in my mind, but a long 30 seconds at that. Oddly, as I always check the time when I wake up, it struck my area at exactly 2PM.
When most of my family got home, I heard their stories. My mother, who works in Philadelphia by the stadiums, said Citizens Bank Park was evacuated immediately. My father, who works in Center City Philadelphia, said the entire city was swarming with people as all the buildings there were evacuated as well. My sister was working in a restaurant, and being hung-over, she too thought she was just “out of it” when the restaurant’s coffee machine started to shake uncontrollably.
Eventually turning on the news, I discovered that the most damage done were a few windows breaking on the tops of some Center City high-rises. The real damage was probably done under the surface, and only time will tell the effects of that. Still, I couldn’t help but laugh at how all the news stations ate up this rare natural disaster, interviewing people on the street as if another 9-11 had occurred.
Sure, this is an event worth noting, especially when we’re on the verge of the seemingly ominous year of 2012. But with the way human beings have treated the Earth, why are we surprised when Mother Nature throws us a few curve balls?