When the quake struck at 5:04pm, I was at my High School. I was waiting for my mom after swim team practice. Our school was off of Old San Jose Rd. which was about 8 miles directly south of Loma Prieta. It was pretty crazy to say the least.
I remember a lot of things about the earthquake and the chaos that ensued but one of the biggest things that stands out in my mind was the sense of community that was formed out of necessity. We did not have the bullshit of all of the red tape, or social parameters that we so strictly live by these days. It was neighbor helping neighbor and everyone did help. It was effortless. It was smooth and efficient. It was beautiful. When i think about how society is breaking down with all of the corruption and greed that we are drowning in today vanishes when the structure of our society gets shook up. We dont need some committee or rule telling us every inch how to live our lives. We KNOW how to live our lives. And without that meddling, true community sprouts up effortlessly. We dont need more laws and groups telling us what is good. We as humans KNOW what is good. If we could get less interference, we would be able to see that we do good things because that is our nature… not because we are told to and if we dont we get into trouble.
While i am waiting patiently for our next big shaker so that rents go down, i from time to time watch this video to remember just who is in charge… hint… it aint us!
Hard to “like” this, but I did. The video gave me chills. I live in Sacramento and I remember on that day at 5 ‘o-something, I had vertigo for a moment. The floor got all squashy Then I looked out at the pool and the water was splashing over the sides. I turned on the TV and saw what your video depicted. Awful and sad.
I can’t imagine what it would be like to experience something like this. Whenever I watched ‘Beverly Hills 90210′ and you’d see the characters reacting to tiny little tremors, the California natives would always take it in their stride whereas folk from the East Coast would be totally freaked out. Is that how you respond to the baby tremors? Are you just pretty used to it?
I hit the ‘Like’ button for the importance of the post and the quality of the writing. The video is really upsetting and looks utterly terrifying. My man’s uncle is from Glasgow but has spent the last thirty years living in San Francisco and he always tells the story (in quite a humorous fashion) about how he missed this one because he was at home, but his brother in law was in his house, drinking all of his good whisky and smoking his weed because he thought he might be able to get away with it…! Awful, eh?
Listening to the video and reports, it’s astonishing just how calm most of these folk seem to be. Wow.
Yep. You got it right on the nose! Those transplants freak out totally and move out of state usually. It is great because it gives us back out cities for a bit. Whenever i feel an earthquake, i get really excited and jump up and tell everyone around me… or ask if they felt it. I think i have this giddy feeling because the big one that i lived through was only 15 seconds. …Now Mexico City’s… a minute and a half! That is enough time to become truly terrified! But i like to see it as it is mother nature’s plan. If one is to die in an earthquake, your time was meant to come right then. The one that i feel for was Buck Helm. Surviving almost a week in 12″ of space to die 29 days later (or something like that). He did however give the bay area a much needed boost of hope that helped us keep on with the recovery. He is a hero!
Mother Nature sure puts us into our place id say. I am glad that i had a chance to LIVE through it! In relation to the severity, i think we are really lucky that more people did not perish!