Fotografo de Bodas, Santiago

March 11, 2010

This morning my bed started shaking again — not violently like it did on the night of the 8.8, but shaking quite a bit nonetheless. I got up in a flash and stood in the doorway — not that I think anything will save me if the house comes crashing down. I did it more for a sense of just having some kind of control and being able to do something.

The shaking in this aftershock didn’t feel at all like The Big One. It felt more like the way The Big One started — an almost gentle sort of rocking the house back and forth. The scariest part about it for me was the noise. The earth made the same dull roaring noise I heard the other night. At first you think it’s just your brain making noise and blocking out your thoughts. And then you realize — no, that sound is coming from the bowels of our planet.

That’s something that you shakes you. It doesn’t shake you in the physical way an earthquake or an aftershock does, but in a way that shakes everything you ever knew — The Earth is solid ground to stand on. And then, I’m not sure if anyone goes there immediately after feeling the floor ripple underneath them, but when I hear that noise of the Earth moving, all I do is try to imagine what the plates below us look like when they’re adjusting themselves. In a sense, to be able to rationalize the shaking and think about exactly where it’s coming from, and why, makes me feel better.

I am no longer afraid of earthquakes or aftershocks. Strangely enough, all this shaking had the opposite effect on me. Before, I had never felt an earthquake and only (comparatively) very small tremors. My fear of the unknown was what made me panic when I’d think about an earthquake hitting. Cold fear would creep up my spine and I’d literally have to fight back shudders every time people in Chile would tell me that they were “due,” for a big one any day now. They were right.

And now I’ve lived through a big one — which is a statement that sounds much more dramatic than it really is. My house didn’t fall. My car wasn’t swept away by the ocean. All I had to do was sit tight and not have a heart attack for three minutes while the Earth took me for a ride. I’m happy to be where we’re living now, with Seba’s parents, because this house withstood the ‘quake of ’85 — now looking back, coming in at a measly 7.8, seems like NADA — especially after we just had a 7.2 aftershock this morning. But anyway, if this house withstood ’85 and now ’10, I am not worried it’s going to fall in an aftershock. The only thing about these large aftershocks that scares me is when I think about what damage they are doing to the people who’s houses had already fallen, or were on the brink of falling.

So this morning, when a 7.2 moved the Earth beneath my feet, and then kept rocking us again and again and again and again until finally we were hit with another strong one of 6.6 — I stood in the doorway because I needed something to do. I picked up Papi who was flipping out at my feet — not because of the aftershock, but because of a cat in the treet (who was flipping out because of the aftershock). As I stood there in the doorway, Seba came out into the other doorway and smiled at me with no trace of fear in his face, holding Papi in my arms — I thought, “If by some freak of nature, this house really does fall on my head, I could think of worse ways to go. If it’s my time, it’s my time.”

And then the ground was still again, the roaring stopped and I headed to edit some photos, take a shower and meet someone for lunch. Life goes on.

24 Comments

Subscribe to comment feed

Facebook comments:

4 Trackbacks

Warning: call_user_func(custom_pings) [function.call-user-func]: First argument is expected to be a valid callback in /home/kylehepp/public_html/wp-includes/comment-template.php on line 1334

Warning: call_user_func(custom_pings) [function.call-user-func]: First argument is expected to be a valid callback in /home/kylehepp/public_html/wp-includes/comment-template.php on line 1334

Warning: call_user_func(custom_pings) [function.call-user-func]: First argument is expected to be a valid callback in /home/kylehepp/public_html/wp-includes/comment-template.php on line 1334

Warning: call_user_func(custom_pings) [function.call-user-func]: First argument is expected to be a valid callback in /home/kylehepp/public_html/wp-includes/comment-template.php on line 1334

20 Comments

Must have been the wedding that shook the world.

Comment by kidreid — March 11, 2010 @ 9:05 am

Reply
lol your bed shook? you lazy bum, that earthquake today hit at almost noon!

i say that out of jest and jealousy haha. then again, todays events ( and the fact that we lost water at work this morning) means i can too take a nap.

Comment by Lydia — March 11, 2010 @ 9:31 am

Reply
Your last paragraph sounded very Chilean. Now it will take something ten times stronger to really scare you.

Comment by I_Marmo_I — March 11, 2010 @ 9:37 am

Reply
“…lost water at work” congratulations, you got the job, after all those weird interviews and tests! Nice!

Comment by I_Marmo_I — March 11, 2010 @ 9:39 am

Reply
You describe the feeling so well. Actually this morning (don't remember what time but it was before I heard about the quake today) was the first time since I've been back home that I felt like the ground was moving. Maybe I am now connected after absorbing the energy of the big one

I think since the quake I try to block out how seriously freaked out I was for 3 minutes really believing the building I was in was going to collapse. This morning I was thinking about that moment and how evil it felt to me I guess with it being so dark, so loud with different noises, and so out of control with even the cat freaking out looking at me with a freaky look (must be a thing with cats). My first instinct was to get the hell out of Chile. I'm actually kind of glad that the airport was closed and I was stuck because it gave me a chance to experience additional tremors (earthquakes as I like to call them and know that they come and go and I'm still ok and have sort of learned the whole “tranquillo” thing during a quake. Although at 6.0 or above my digestive system kicks in. What you say is true “smiled at me with no trace of fear in his face” I find this very cool about my Chileno (and maybe this is something in general about Chilean men) that they are very good at staying calm in a crisis/stressful situation. I look at the situation as me being lucky to have experienced it as it made me closer to my husband and son and has made me stronger as a person. There are not many situations I can think of where one would honestly feel that scared and out of control and walk away unscathed. I really need to post on my Chile trip…I've been a very bad blogger but I think I'm motivated now

Comment by Aimee — March 11, 2010 @ 12:00 pm

Reply
I have never really felt strong earthquakes, there was one in NH when I lived there that was just like a big bang and that's it. And then there have been a couple of really little ones in Melbourne. For one of them I was sitting on the grass and a bunch of girls starting screaming and going “IS THE EARTH SHAKING THE EARTH? IS THIS AN EARTHQUAKE”… It seemed so silly to be afraid when we were out in the grass like that.

Comment by Decoybetty — March 11, 2010 @ 1:43 pm

Reply
haha, i did, actually, thanks. i now work 4 places and am completely exhausted.

Comment by Lydia — March 11, 2010 @ 2:54 pm

Reply
There. are. no. words. . .

WOW!!! Wish I give you some free acupuncture to help calm your poor sympathetic nervous system.

Comment by GlobalButterfly — March 11, 2010 @ 6:25 pm

Reply
You are very resilient Kyle. This post shows that you have a very strong personality which will bring you very far in life.

Comment by vanessa2010 — March 12, 2010 @ 8:48 am

Reply
Hmmmm, you might not be scared, but you've just brought me to tears – 2nd time in 2 weeks! Sounds utterly terrifying – but I'm glad you've taken it in your usual stride. Hell, you've been thrown through the air by a car – an earthquake is nothing, right?
Hugs, lovely xx

Comment by elizaclaire — March 12, 2010 @ 2:01 pm

Reply
You are very resilient Kyle. This post shows that you have a very strong personality which will bring you very far in life.

Comment by vanessa2010 — March 12, 2010 @ 4:48 pm

Reply
Hmmmm, you might not be scared, but you've just brought me to tears – 2nd time in 2 weeks! Sounds utterly terrifying – but I'm glad you've taken it in your usual stride. Hell, you've been thrown through the air by a car – an earthquake is nothing, right?
Hugs, lovely xx

Comment by elizaclaire — March 12, 2010 @ 10:01 pm

Reply
Haha, maybe

Comment by kyleracine — March 15, 2010 @ 5:40 am

Reply
Well, i guess that's one thing that aftershocks are good for it.

Comment by kyleracine — March 15, 2010 @ 5:41 am

Reply
So true!

Comment by kyleracine — March 15, 2010 @ 5:42 am

Reply
Well, it is weird to feel the ground move under your feet. Maybe they were more surprised than scared.

Comment by kyleracine — March 15, 2010 @ 5:46 am

Reply
Ah..i just need more champagne, sigh.

Comment by kyleracine — March 15, 2010 @ 5:46 am

Reply
It's such a sudden thing — not like a hurricane or a tornado that you know is coming. You can't prepare, it just catches you off guard — and naked in bed according to lots of people I've talked to.

I'm excited to read your blog post on the earthquake to really hear everything you were thinking in those moments. My mother in law was telling me that she was way more scared for the smaller earthquake in '85 because it made her fear for her children, more than fear for herself.

Comment by kyleracine — March 15, 2010 @ 5:51 am

Reply
Thanks Vanessa, I'm not so sure about that, but for now I'll just keep trucking along

Comment by kyleracine — March 15, 2010 @ 5:51 am

Reply
Eliza, I don't want to make you cry! Save that for when we meet some day, share a bottle of bubbly, get really drunk and then cry about how much we love doing weddings

Comment by kyleracine — March 15, 2010 @ 5:53 am

Reply