The first earthquake I ever felt wasn’t even the one that did the damage. It was an aftershock, and I happened to be visiting relatives in Firebaugh, CA, about 50 miles from where a big quake had leveled downtown Coalinga in 1983.
More than 5,000 aftershocks were recorded over the next three months. One morning at the breakfast table, my mom’s cousin was describing how often they hit, and mentioned that one was happening right then. It was small enough that you had to be paying attention to notice it. It felt more like a stereo vibrating the floor than anything shaking the house.
I was reminded of that Monday night when I felt my desk chair start to move. At first it was just a mild shake, the kind you almost talk yourself out of noticing, and then it picked up enough that there was no mistaking it. A moment later, a stack of papers flew off a shelf and landed on the arm of the chair where my cat Vaquero was sleeping. He jumped straight in the air out of fright, then glared at me as if I’d thrown them at him.
It’s been mostly just he and I home alone for the past few months since my dog died, and he probably spent more of his time with the dog than I did. He was a stray who adopted us about a year and a half ago, and he appears to dislike being alone. When I’m working, he stays in the chair next to my desk except for when he wanders off for a nibble or to use his box, but then he’s right back. And because we spend so much time alone together, I’ve gotten used to talking to him. Surprisingly, unlike most cats, he’s very reactive when I speak.
So when he glared at me after the stack of papers disrupted his nap, I knew he thought I had done it. As I picked the stack up from the floor and put it back on the shelf, I told Vaquero, “If I was going to do something, I would have squirted you with water, not thrown papers at you.” It may have been my imagination that he understood, but there was no imagining the change in his demeanor. I’m not delusional enough to think he knew what I was saying, but he was clearly calmed by either my voice or my tone.
Living in the southern California high desert for three years in my late teens, I got used to earthquakes, to the point that I actually enjoyed the sensation, as long as I knew it wasn’t strong enough to knock walls down on me.
I realized pretty quickly this one wasn’t going to do that, but Vaquero didn’t. Something startled him, and I was the only thing nearby, so I was the obvious culprit.
Eventually the room felt still again, and not more than two or three minutes later, he was sound asleep, just like nothing had happened.
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