Hope and Wire

As I sit here watching the TV3 dramatisation of the earthquakes, I am wondering why I decided to watch it at all.

I think maybe, I wanted to feel something, relief perhaps. Maybe I wanted to prove that I am over it, that I don't care anymore, that I can actually watch something with earthquake footage in it and be ok.

I was an extra in one scene. I'd auditioned for the show the day I found out I was pregnant, and when I got called up to be in a scene I thought it would be fun. But it wasn't. It was cold, and took 5 hours longer than we were told it would. Plus, they didn't pay a lot of us. I didn't say yes to any other offers of work.

I was impressed that they started in September. It seems like everyone else has forgotten that February wasn't the start of it all. Like it was just one earthquake. All the others not as serious and therefore, not really there.

I thought it was funny, the way they filmed the September Quake, a lot of screaming, camera shaking and a funny scene with a naked property tycoon and his young asian wife. I also thought it was funny how many maori people were playing lead roles, since I hardly know any maori people, and I live in Christchurch - the whitest city in NZ. Then I chastised myself for being so racist.

But then graphic showed up telling us it was now February 22nd, and out of nowhere I felt nervous.

Little graphics started popping up, 10:38, 11:07, 12:35. I was messaging my sister, telling her I was getting nervous. One of the characters was driving, trying to get away from the city for a quake-break, leaving her husband behind for work. Then the clock ticked to 1:07. She turns on the radio to news of the quake and I start to cry as I see her face. I remember making that same face. I remember too much.

And then it was 12.51pm.

They interspersed shots of drama with actual news footage. Shelves shaking. Cars shaking. Cathedral square and Cashel St. Bits of building falling to the ground.

Suddenly it all comes rushing back. The sound of the 'cannot get through' signal on the cell phones. My fear that my husband was dead. That surely the uni had collapsed. The gridlock. The sirens. The immediate and numerous aftershocks. I was shaking so bad I feared I shouldn't be driving. But then I wasn't sure if I was shaking, or the ground was shaking.

Then I am crying, and I can't stop. The most I've cried about the event since it happened. The fear, all rushing back. I'm remembering being sure that my husband was dead. That the university must have collapsed in such a shake. I remember the desperation of pressing redial, redial, redial, and hearing those horrible, lonely trio of 'cant get through' tones. I'm remembering the desperation of parking on the side of the road and running to the university because the roads were stuck. No one could move. The students were evacuating. Everyone was trying to reach everyone else.

I wanted to watch this show to prove I was ok. I haven't watched anything else about the earthquakes until now. But clearly, I am not.

I wonder how long it takes to get over something like that. Or if perhaps, you just don't?