This is only a test

“Entering Tsunami Hazard Zone”

We pass the sign along the highway as we drive into Seaside.  I pass the sign a few times a week, at least.  Seaside is our nearest town, where we go to Safeway, visit the library, the post office, take the recycling, and perhaps the second-hand shop.

I am used to the sign now, I barely notice it as we drive by.  But I am aware of it.

Several years ago, scientists made a rather startling discovery.  The looked at the geological record and realized that the Pacific Northwest has a repeated history of big earthquakes, out under the Cascadia Subduction Zone, followed by a large tsunami only minutes later.  Roughly every 250 years.  The last one was exactly 318 years ago.

Basically, we know the “big one” is coming.  It’s pretty much a fact.  There WILL be a large earthquake, 9 on the Richter scale, immediately followed by a devastating tsunami.

I have thought lot about this. How you could not when your family lives near the coast?  When we visit a beach, we pass a sign, with a map indicating which was to run if an earthquake happens.  Because the earthquake will be so near the coast, the tsunami will hit within 15 to 20 minutes.  There will be no alarm sounding, no alerts on your cell phone. There won’t be time.  The signs states starkly; “the ground shaking is your only warning.”

I look at these maps, if visiting a new beach.  I think about how long it would take me to gather the kids and run to higher ground, beyond the hazard zone.

I don’t worry about it.  Several years ago, I was reading the scientific reports and thinking about an upcoming trip to visit my parents.  I prayed about it.  “Should we think about this in making our plans?”  I felt like God told me that I didn’t need to worry about it. So I haven’t.  But I do plan.

We carry an emergency bag in the car, with changes of clothes, water, and some food.   The girls and I have gone over the evacuation route in Seaside: past the library, over the bridge and up the hill.  They know not to take a car, but to go on foot.

This fall there was a small earthquake a few miles from our house.  It didn’t do any damage, but we were upstairs at bedtime, getting ready for bed. It shook the house and we heard it coming.  It scared the girls so much, they couldn’t get to sleep. Because here, and earthquake is not just an earthquake. It makes you wonder if this is “the big one”.  We talked a little about the safest place to be during an earthquake, and what we should do afterward.  Then we got our minds on something else, and eventually we all got to sleep.

It’s strange, living in a place where you know that someday, sooner or later, disaster will hit. It’s not a maybe, it’s not perhaps, and it’s a certainty.  And there will be no warning.  With other disasters, you know its coming. Hurricanes give you time to evacuate.  Tornados have warnings.  Volcanoes can be predicted.  But earthquakes come by surprise. Scientists can look at fault lines, and make predictions, but even with all our technology, we can’t actually tell when they are going to happen.

I don’t usually think about it while I am walking on the beach.  We try to go at least once a week, even if it’s cold and rainy.  There’s something so calming and healing about being on a beach. The sound of the waves, the sight of the ocean stretching out, the feel of sand on your feet, just getting out into the natural world and experiencing something beyond our little worlds that we make for ourselves.  It’s really good medicine.

I don’t think about the coming tsunami when I am on the beach.  I want to enjoy the moment, and God told me not to worry about the earthquake, so I try not to.

One day, last fall, Alex and I were walking on the beach in Seaside.  We had wandering with Lucy down to the edge of the waves (the Seaside beach is very wide, you have to walk quite a ways to get down to the water). It was a lovely day, windy and cool, but there was some blue sky visible and it wasn’t raining.  As we walked, we heard loud sirens beginning to sound. I had seen the loud speakers up along the shore, but had never really thought about them.  I knew it couldn’t be a real warning… there had been no earthquake.  Still, I looked out to see uneasily and we started back towards the car, and away from the waves.  As we walked, we heard the message: “This is a test of the emergency warning system…. This is only a test.”

The message was then repeated in Spanish… “esta es solamente una prueba.”

The message seemed full of meaning to us that day.  We felt stuck between a rock and a hard place. We had come from Panama to the US for a few months, and my health and other factors hadn’t allowed us to return.  We felt like we were drifting.  The only clear direction we had was to attend the Family DTS in Kona, but that was months away.  All our plans and dreams seemed on hold, and there didn’t seem to be a way out.

“This is only a test.”  We chuckled a little over the message.  This is only a test. It’s not a real disaster, it’s not the end, and it’s not the “big one”.  It’s just a test. Solamente una prueba.

We were being tested on every level: emotional, spiritual, relationship, physical.  We were having to give things us, rethink our life and our direction, our very identity.  We were facing obstacles and having to trying God when it looked impossible. And we still have to. 

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In the next 2 months we need to raise thousands of dollars to attend the Family DTS.  Impossible.  But this is just a test.  It’s not the end yet.