I don't really know what to make of this earthquake business. To be sure, it is unsettling. Take this morning for example. I was sitting on my blue couch, catching up on the morning's headlines in Aus, when I thought I'd had a sudden dizzy spell. I wasn't drinking coffee and I don't smoke so as I regained my sensibilities I turned my attention to the door standing ajar. Sure enough, it was gently swinging on its hinges, back-and-forth, while my shirts on their hangers rocked from side-to-side like a school of cotton jelly fish floating through my bedroom! Weird. But that's exactly what earthquakes are. Weird with a capital W. I got up and pulled on some pants (I was fresh out of the shower) and strode into the living room then back into my bedroom then outside then back inside again and so on, until before I could walk in any more circles it had subsided. That's the thing. It's impossible to know what to do. It's as great a sense of apprehension as I've ever felt.
A couple of weeks ago I wrote about the meaty one that caused all the train delays in Shinjuku. In that case, real fear invaded my mind but panic did not. My heart pounded, adrenaline pumped through me and a nervousness sounded clear as a bell in my voice. I didn't panic but I don't know how much longer I would have held out, had that particular quake continued. But, imagining I had well and truly freaked, what would I have done? Flown down the stairs and out onto the street, surrounded by department stores and multi-story office blocks? Refuge? Hardly. So it seems, as with most misfortunes in life, it all comes down to sheer luck (or lack there of). You're either lying in an open field with nothing but blue sky above you when the big one hits or you're stuck in a crowded subway train. As the Japanese say, shoganai. It can't be helped. As for me, I just hope I've got my pants on.
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