Your Woman on the Street Reporting

Hubby left for work quite early yesterday morning. I had the day off, so I saw him off from the comfort of our bed. There I lounged reading, drinking coffee and contemplating a caffeine nap followed by some yoga and maybe some writing. 

At 6:03 am SOMETHING happened. NOISE. The house shook, the windows rattled and the bed jumped. I had two thoughts. Earthquake or intruders. Both were reasonable assumptions. We live in the Pacific Northwest, and we have felt small tremors before. We also live in a neighbourhood that lends itself to interesting activities. Since moving here we've had one break-in, and we've experienced a bout of vandalism that included smashed windows. (On really good days I can think of those events as "forced de-cluttering" and "an opportunity to discover the comedy of Craig Ferguson's Late Late Show", respectively.)

After the initial impact nothing happened. When my terror subsided and I was able to breathe and move, I summoned my bravery and investigated. My first step was to call Hubby at work. (My first instinct was to call my Mommy, because that's what 47-year-old adults do when they're scared witless.) Hubby works within walking distance of our house, so I figured he would have felt a quake had there been one. 

He had, in fact, heard something, but hadn't experienced the shaking. He stayed on the line and provided calm reassurance while I checked the house for damage/intruders/monsters. Thankfully, there was nothing. I was still quite rattled, so I hopped back in bed to cower. It was past 8:00 am before I felt able to get up and on with my day.

From that point on my day seemed slightly off-kilter. Plans for yoga and writing and shopping fell away. Breakfast dishes sat in the sink until dinner time. It didn't matter. Nothing like a mysterious seismic event to provide some perspective. As a result of this letting go, I had a surprisingly good day: A walk to the coffee shop where I was delighted to find that my latte purchase entitled me to a complementary muffin. Lunch with co-workers followed by cake with even more co-workers. Two trips to the chocolate shop. 

As I was entering the chocolate shop the first time I ran into a woman who has been off her feet for a while. As we sat in the sun (she needed to keep her empurpled toes elevated) and visited, we were joined by a fellow with a camera. We chatted with him for a few moments. Then he asked if we had experienced the still-unexplained early-morning event and the camera was on. On me.

That slightly bizarre feeling of the day, combined with the sun and my companion's complements about my writing, lead me to cooperate with the cameraman. Any anxiety I would normally feel in such circumstances didn't materialize. I was relaxed, and I was confident, and I later appeared on the news. 

Given all the people the reporter Gord Kurbis spoke to, I'm surprised my comments made the cut. My co-workers and I should have ordered champagne with our lunch to celebrate my moment of stardom.