Member-only story
This Is Us
This Virus Exposes Our World as It Really Is
When the tide recedes, the ruins, the rocks, and the pearls are revealed
One day at the Oregon beach, the kids were small, and we were flying kites while the dog chased seagull shadows along the sand. The sun was shining. Suddenly, a siren began to wail, screaming along the entire beach. The tsunami siren.
A clammy, cold tremble ricocheted through my body, a jolt of existential fear in the midst of this great expanse of sea and sand and sun, laughter still echoing in my ears. I scooped up my two kids and screamed at my husband to leave, we have to leave, now. No, forget your stuff, forget the filled fridge, the clothes and the toothbrushes, grab the dog, get in the car, go, just go. My panic made my children cry. We tore out of the quiet seaside town, leaving everything behind, up, up, up out of the tsunami range. We pulled into the car park on the cliff top, alongside all the other evacuees. From the safety of the cliff we waited and watched.
Everything was suspended, hauntingly silent, a pause in time, the ultimate expression of presence. All future was gone. Suddenly, the sea pulled back, way back, farther back than any low tide I’d ever seen, silently, swiftly, leaving wet sand and rocks, darker and darker the farther the…
