THE EAST COAST GOT SHAKEN, RATTLED, AND ROLLED
(….even though it hardly knows how to spell….earthquake)

A rare seismic event hit north central Virginia, Tuesday, registering 5.8 on the Richter scale. By California standards it was just a mother earth hiccup. But, the entire East Coast, from the Carolinas to Maine, and as far west as Toronto, got shaken, rattled, and rolled by it, even though it hardly knows how to spell….earthquake. Washington DC, in particular, had its people all out in the streets because of it. Surprisingly very minor damages seem to have occurred, although the Washington Monument apparently suffered some cracking near its top, and the National Cathedral, dropped a few of its spires.

Baltimore seems to have had slightly more damage occur there. As for New York, a few buildings just swayed, and David Letterman had to pause briefly in his ongoing rants about some idiot’s “fatwah” against him (sometimes….earthquakes do have positive aspects to them). To be honest, when I first heard the news, I had difficulty believing it. Never in my entire lifetime had I ever heard of anything like this event occurring back East.

Back home, in Missouri, however, yes. In the Forties, while at one of those fancy debutante balls, a group of us were out on the terrace sitting around a table with those charming debutantes in their ball gowns, when a sudden and very strong jolt hit, knocking us all to the ground. Gentlemen that we were, we guys protectively cuddled up closely to our frightened girls, embracing them tightly with hormonal enthusiasm as several after-shocks followed. Some of us even managed to roll under that table with them in our arms, taking advantage of the occasion for a bit of non-seismic related romancing. But, the ever eagle-eyed chaperones soon swooped over from wherever they’d taken refuge, putting a stop to it all before things got out of control (kill joys!).

Few people realize that two hundred years ago, near New Madrid, Missouri, one of the strongest earthquakes to ever hit the continental USA, changed the course of the Mississippi, rang church bells in Boston, and otherwise jolted just about every state east of that river. That mid-continent fault is still potentially one of the most devastating ones in this country….just waiting….waiting….waiting.

Well, in some ways, such natural events are an allegory about America. We get some hard knocks now and then, often with very devastating results, but, we’re still standing tall when they’re over, ready to pick up the pieces and rebuild something newer and better in place of what was knocked down. It’s what we do.

May that ever be so.

CENTURION