All Shook Up

The house shifted on her foundation, striking a careless pose as powerful ripples of earth energy made her floor boards dance. Each oaken strip did a wild piano-key tango - gyrating in jazzy wave formation with the other boards, as if they were in a vintage black and white cartoon of a keyboard. 

When the undulating stopped, all was quiet save for the hanging pots and pans clanging over the kitchen counter, and the slosh of the swimming pool water heaving over the sides.

“Shiver me timbers,” Houser exhaled to Dody Deodar, who stood shading her east side.

Crows began to caw noisily from Dody’s crown as soon as the shaking subsided. Then sirens and howling dogs were heard.

House and tree had been through this before; both knew the drill. Dody emanated stately calm, hoping to soothe the black birds so new to shakes ‘n’ quakes.

“I hope, when my people come home, they notice how strong and brave I am,” breathed Houser.

But the people didn’t come back, and didn’t come back. Houser didn’t know what could be keeping them so long. Dody, with her superior height, could just make out the place where the highway once stood. It was piled and buckled like a collection of untidy pinecones. She reported this to Houser who suspected it had something to do with her people staying away so long.

Sirens blared all the way into the night. Several subsequent rolling rides lulled Houser to sleep. Wailing vehicles awakened her. And so it went for three days. On the evening of the third day, SOMEONE opened Houser’s front door! She’d been asleep on her foundations, just nestling in, while a softening siren marked its distance. 

Who could this intruder be, she wondered. Her people always announced themselves with the family car pulling into the driveway. The only sound besides the fading wail she’d heard was the sound of feet on pavement.

Then she recognized the familiar sounds of her people, crying and thirsty for water. The earthquake created leaks in the pipes, so that no water was coming to the house nor out her taps. Not one drop. Houser sensed the refrigerator being opened. Happy gasps of joy as her people guzzled still cool water from ice gone liquid in the freezer. They also found grape juice and apple juice - still good - in plastic bottles on the door of the fridge. All this they found by flashlight. Electricity was out. Water was out. Gas wasn't going on… 

While the family was exclaiming over their good fortune to still have a house, and talking over all they had seen in the last few days, a huge aftershock ripped through - almost as big as the initial shaker. Dody Deodar dug her roots in deep. Hauser relaxed her frame. The family scuttled to stand under her sturdy doorways, flashing their lights crazily, at odd angles, as they held onto Hauser’s sturdy bones. Again pots and pans clanked, pool water sloshed, floor boards did their cartoonish dance, and crows and baby cried. 

This temblor did in the gas line. Smelling it, dad and older daughter ran out back, flashlights in hand, to turn off the main line, while mom and little brother tried to reassure baby sister, whose wailing matched the pitch of sirens going by. Mom said, and son repeated: “All will be well. All will be well...” even when they themselves weren’t so sure.

Hearts beat in unison like humming bird wings.

Were they ready for the future? 

Only time would tell.