Did the Earth Move for You, Too?

I heard there was another aftershock very early this morning. Though still awake, I didn't feel it. (There have been about a dozen, though almost all of them to a lesser degree than today's, since Friday.)

I did, however, feel the earth move early Friday. At 4:37 a.m., I awoke to a shaking bed. (It was like something straight out of The Exorcist, minus the spinning head and green, projectile vomit.) By the time I realized it was shaking and jumped out of it, I noticed that the whole room was trembling, as if it might detach itself from the back of the house. It certainly felt like it would anyway.

There is something incredibly surreal about standing in an almost completely dark room and watching one's empty bed shake violently. Being startled awake didn't help much as my initial verbal response was, "What the hell?!"

I don't remember much about the one that hit in 1968, and was just a tad stronger than Friday's. For some reason, I think I was watching "Corky the Clown" at the time.(I'd have to check out old TV listings to see if this is even possible. I was barely 3.) I do vividly remember though my grandmother tearing through the house, scooping me up, tucking me under her arm and running out the front door and into the yard. All the while, she was carrying Nellie Bell in her cage. (Nellie was a baby sparrow my mother had rescued in a storm, about the time I was born.)

I also remember that either a tea cup or a saucer in the china cabinet was broken during all the shaking. Luckily, that didn't happen at my house this time, though I do know people who had pictures fall from walls or porcelain collectibles drop from shelves and shatter. Bummer.

I guess we should just feel lucky that it wasn't homes collapsing or cars dropping from bridges.