Today New York city down to Virginia had a sizable shaking, a rarity for the East Cost and unlike California where I reside, and earthquakes come with the price of being in L. A. Ironically, my very first earthquake was back in New Jersey in 1992, I was living in Hoboken and would drive home to my grandmother's house in Wyckoff, to stay with my Aunt while my grandmother had flown to Atlanta to stay with my parents over the Thanksgiving holiday. Unfortunately, my Grandmother had taken seriously ill the last days of her stay and never made it to eat turkey. The morning she died, I had woken up in my aunt's bedroom jolted by what sounded like a truck going over the railroad tracks in the very early morning, jolted from my sleep like waking from a bad dream, to find out later we had a small earthquake. I was amused as I drove into the East Village to work on editing my thesis film in the basement of the blue building that now is a dorm for NYU, later to walk past the guard Romeo, who let me stay past closing hours to get my film done. I remember walking outside to smoke a Djarum cigarette after calling my Mom to hear my Grandmother had passed - she was in her 80's back then, so the cancer took her fast. As I walked up 2nd Avenue for a egg cream at the Gem Spa, I thought of all the Sunday family dinners we had growing up - the amount of people she prepared massive dinners for, how every holiday was another feast to wade through. I thought of how food, love, and memories are like deep crevices inside us living on forever, just waiting to be remember with one tiny little jolt. For this I am grateful. Rock on, Gram.
