I slept through my first earthquake.

Shortly after 4 a.m., a 4.4 magnitude earthquake centered in Decatur, Tenn., about 40 miles from where I was sleeping, struck, making it the topic of conversation on social media and the news.

Maybe it wasn’t my first earthquake. I almost seem to recall experiencing one while on vacation someplace. But I don’t have any specific details, just a vague feeling that maybe it happened. Perhaps whoever I was traveling with will remember and remind me.

Earthquakes aren’t common in Wisconsin, where I lived for most of my life. We were more likely to get jumps from sonic booms when the jets were flying at Hardwood Bombing Range. Those are enough to rattle the windows and shake the foundation.

But earthquakes of the seismic sort aren’t frequent in Wisconsin. The U.S. Geological Service tracks earthquakes. If you look up Wisconsin on the site, you can see a hazard map with nothing on it and a list of all the earthquakes in Wisconsin since 1900. There are 11 listed, and five of those were from mining explosions in Michigan.

By contrast, Tennessee’s map is much more colorful, and the list for seismicity lists M2.5+ earthquakes in the past 30 days – although, to be fair, the most recent ones recorded were in 2016 and ranged from 2.5 to 2.8.

So earthquakes you can feel aren’t common here.

Did you feel it?

On the USGS site, there’s a map called “Did you feel it?” (that’s the image that accompanies this post) of where people said they did – or didn’t — feel it.

It’s the first question everyone asked today: Did you feel it?

I got my first inkling when I checked Instagram. The local coffee shop, Wired Coffee Bar, posted an image of coffee sloshing out of a cup and encouraged people to come in for coffee if they were quaked awake at 4 a.m.

I probably would have forgotten about it, but my sister asked me when I went down for breakfast. She was half awake when it happened and thought perhaps it was a low-flying chopper. We agreed it would have been better to experience it during the day when we were fully awake and to see how the pets reacted.

I often will wake around 4 a.m. – if I check the time, which I don’t always do. (Sometimes the cat is up that early, mewing and banging on the door.) Apparently, I was not awake today for the earthquake. I’m a pretty sound sleeper, so it’s unlikely it would have jarred me awake.

Like the proverbial tree falling in the forest, I don’t know I can claim to have felt anything from this earthquake.

Perhaps it can serve as a metaphor — an earthquake metaphor — for me to not be asleep when important things happen – to be aware of what’s happening in my life and to appreciate it when something shakes it up.

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Be a Better Writer Tip

 

Use bold or italics in copy to draw attention to certain phrases. In this post, I used italics to set off the two widely different times frames noted on the USGS website for earthquakes, comparing Wisconsin and Tennessee. Use bold or italics sparingly to make an impact. If you use either too often, your readers will get used to it and not always make the connection that you want.