i was in an earthquake yesterday!!!

        I was in an earthquake yesterday! Did you know Northeast Ohio can even have earthquakes? Because it can, and kinda big ones. MY earthquake was a 4.0. According to one website, there have been nearly 200 here since the USA became a thing.
        It was about 10:30, and I was still in bed. I was actually reading a Thich Nhat Hanh book about loving kindness because my shrink told me to look into loving kindness, and I was Getting Into It. I actually bought a ton of Thich Nhat Hanh books before the move to NE OH, but then I stopped reading them, partly bc I was having too many Big Sad Feelings to be able to concentrate on them. But his writing makes me feel so good and it’s all about the present moment and so I felt all zoned into that and then my bed started shaking and I almost had a heart (panic) attack. Am I conveying here the hilarious irony here of finally picking up this book I know will make me feel better and then something terrifying in my present moment happens?
        My first thought: oh no, I fucked something up (like used too much water and the hot water heater has exploded-- I DO NOT understand how these work) and now my apartment’s falling down.
        Second: you stupid narcissist, it was probably a truck that drove into your building, which is probably getting ready to collapse and kill you. So then I decided to Take Action and checked every window for a truck stuck in my building.
        Third: well it def wasn’t an earthquake because NE OH doesn’t get those.
        The only next logical step was to scream at google: WAS THERE AN EARTHQUAKE IN CLEVELAND LIKE JUST NOW? It’s strange how little Google immediately knows about an unpredictable natural disaster with like no warning signs (besides I guess sometimes cats put their ears back like 10 seconds before it happens?) that happen significantly less than once a year. For shame.
        Nothing on google about an earthquake in NE OH means there wasn’t an earthquake in NE OH. (Reader, if you read the title of this bitch, you already know there WAS an earthquake in  NE OH.) I try again: GOOGLE, ARE YOU SURE THERE WASN’T AN EARTHQUAKE?
        This time, I find a website where you can submit an earthquake report. The website says to submit one even if you’re not sure you were actually in an earthquake. So I take an uncharacteristically self-confident step forward and decide to fill out the form--and they can just delete it later when it turns out I’ve been characteristically anxiety-spiralling for no reason, right?
        Then, Twitter. People post dumb shit on there all day long. If something REALLY happened (LIKE AN EARTHQUAKE), people would want to talk about it. I find a single tweet about it. I WAS RIGHT. I like the tweet, click on the profile to see who said it, read a couple of incredibly problematic tweets, unlike the thing to disassociate from this monster, and then re-like it because even bad people can help you out by confirming your sanity when you’re questioning whether you were single handedly responsible for the end of the world or not.
        I tweet that nobody even told me there are earthquakes in OH. (I am reiterating that sentiment now! I got like no warning about this even though nobody will shut up about the crazy goddamn winter weather here.) I refresh my earthquake Twitter search and see #ClevelandEarthquake for the first time--here is where all of the tweets I need have been hiding. One guy said he AND his wife felt it! Another said so did he AND his neighbors. GUYS: so did I!!!!!
        All of this has taken place over the course of about seven minutes. I went from terrified to excited for Baby’s First Earthquake (Baby= me).  That is all the time it takes for my mom to send a text. She lives 1,000 miles away and heard about it on facebook somehow and was checking on me. She basically went into mom-mode before I’d even figured out all the way that I’d actually been in an earthquake. I answer all of her questions with lots of exclamation marks.
        Later, I get a text from my dad at work. I use all the same jokes again: When I woke up this morning, I didn’t expect to be in my first earthquake!!! I am the Family Celebrity of the Day, especially after I get a call from my Grandma and tell all my jokes for the third time while Connor rolls his eyes at me: When I woke up blah blah my first earthquake!!! (all the time just glossing over the fact that I was still in bed closing in on 11am).
        But truthfully, when I woke up yesterday, I had no idea I’D BE IN MY FIRST EARTHQUAKE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(Please leave your earthquake questions (EQQs) in the comments. I am an expert now and happy to share my experiences and finely crafted earthquake material (jokes) of the last 24 hours.)

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