Sans Fig Leaf

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"When she moves..."

28 February, 2001

There's nothing like an earthquake to put you in your place.

The situation at work has been taking up a lot of my emotional energy and time. Last week a number of my co-workers were laid off. It was upsetting, of course. I've been trying to keep things in perspective, but it hasn't been easy.

Then the earth moved.

I was on the phone in my fifth floor office (with a view of the Space Needle). For a second I thought that someone was moving some heavy furniture. Then I realized it was an earthquake. Julie, who was on the other end of the line in her home over on the east side of the lake, said, "It's a big one!" just before the connection went dead.

I was under my desk, listening to the earth rumble and the building creak. I didn't remember making the decision to get under the desk. I didn't remember dropping to the floor. I was just suddenly there. The ceiling was making lots of interesting noises. I peeked out from under the desk and saw that my hanging plants were swaying quite violently.

I scurried back under the desk. I didn't know how long it had been, but it seemed to have gone on much longer than any previous earthquake I had been in.

The floor was rolling, like a flag in the breeze. That couldn't be right, I thought. Concrete is rigid, it doesn't flex like that.

The groaning and creaking of the building got louder. I couldn't believe that the shaking hadn't stopped yet. I've been in lots of quakes. They never lasted this long.

The rumble from deep in the earth faded. But the building was still moving. A lot. Now that the roaring of the earth was gone, all of the creaking, groaning, and snapping of the building itself seemed even louder.

My computer started beeping. I looked toward the door. Half of my interior wall is glass, and I could see the reflection of the building across the street, dancing. How could the glass shake and bend like that without breaking? I wondered. I glanced to my right. I could see the other work surface, the one that is attached to the wall, bouncing and bucking.

When is it going to stop? I wondered.

The work surface didn't seem to be shaking as violently as it had been just a moment ago. The creaking and groaning sounds of the building were subsiding.

I took a deep breath. And another. I went through the little checklist in my head. Check on my neighbors. Remember where the first aid kits are. Keep an eye open for broken glass.

I climbed from beneath the desk and looked around. The plants were still swaying, but the walls weren't. I was still clutching the phone, which was dead. I dropped the handset into the cradle. My hands were shaking.

I ran to the next office to check on my nearest neighbor. She was under her desk. I asked if she was all right. She didn't say anything. I asked again. "Yes. Yes."

She had been crying.

"Are you sure, you're okay? Want me to get something?"

"I hate earthquakes," she said, peering out from under the desk. "That's why I moved from California."

"Yeah," I said. "I hate it too." I held up my hands so she could see that I was trembling pretty severely. "Damn, it was scary. I'm going to go check on everyone else."

My other co-workers were all shaken up, but no one was injured. Some offices had a lot of spilled books, discs, and the like. Some light fixtures had fallen down.

I ran back to my nearest co-worker. She was just climbing from beneath the desk. We talked for a while as she composed herself. Then she decided to try to call her husband. I went back to my office to call Michael.

I couldn't get an outgoing circuit. Of course not, I thought. Half the city is calling each other. And just imagine how many phones were knocked off the hook by the shaking itself.

I turned on the radio to find out how far-reaching the earthquake was. They didn't have an estimate of the magnitude. You could hear how emotional many people were as they reported on specific parts of the region. The quake was felt as far north as Vancouver, BC, and as far south as Portland, Oregon.

I tried calling home again. Michael was okay. He was checking the house. It seemed that nothing had been seriously damaged in the house. He was going to check the outside and the basement. I let him go.

I stopped in mid-motion, my hand poised over the phone I had just hung back up.

My hand was still trembling.

Co-workers from nearby began gathering in my office, because I have a radio. We started exchanging stories about what it felt like for each of us.

The radio people announced that it was only a 4.2 quake. "No way," several of us said. We had lived through the 5.1 six years ago, and it was nothing like this one.

The radio people announced that the quake had only lasted 15 seconds. I had trouble believing that, as well.

They switched over to the national newsfeed. There it was reported that the quake was at least a 6.2 and had lasted for 30-45 seconds. That seemed more believable. A few hours later the consensus was that it was a 6.8. One of the many experts interviewed on the radio said that the length of time the ground shook would vary depending on where you were, and that modern buildings, which are designed to flex rather than break when quakes hit, will continue shaking for 20-40 seconds after the quake ends.

As the day progressed, you could feel the tension and worry still in the air. A small number of people around the region have been reported seriously injured. Many more suffered minor injuries. Some buildings have had to be evacuated because of structural damage. There have been some mud slides.

And somehow, little things like the acquisition, launch of the new company, and the looming possibility of another acquisition, seem pretty unimportant.

They say that after the big quake of '49 (which was about the same magnitude and was centered in the same place as this one) mudslides continued for three days. Not because of aftershocks, because there were no measurable aftershocks to that one. It was just because sometimes the earth moves quickly. And sometimes she takes her time.

But when she moves, she moves.