I have vague recollections from about toddler height of the house shaking and my mother grabbing me in a panic. She in her turn told me tales of earthquakes when she was a child, including one in which she was in the front half, second floor when her home cracked in half and separated from the rest of the house, stranding her in midair.

I was here in 1989, and that one cured me of thinking that earthquakes are nature's fun-filled little amusement park ride. I was half asleep taking a nap just before 5PM, when my cat jumped on to the window ledge beside the bed and started howling at me; animals know, they hear the subsonics or something like that. I didn't understand the warning, though, until the house started swaying and flexing east to west. The shaking lasted only a few seconds that seemed like an eternity, and then the real nightmare began, listening to ever-more-horrible damage reports on a portable radio, huddling with the neighbors, and worrying about my wife of the time, who'd been at work and was out of contact for hours (cell phones were relatively rare in 1989, and in any case the quake knocked out most of the relay towers). She got home hours later, just fine; and there was no significant damage to my house or neighborhood. You can imagine, that's an experience I'll never forget.