Have you ever experienced an earthquake?

Thousands to one degree or another. Most of which were deemed to be "aftershocks" of the 1971 Sylmar California quake. I have trouble with the aftershock concept. At least 4-5 years after that initial quake they were calling 3 pointers aftershocks. I could lay on the living room floor and look at the curtain rod over the picture window and watch it shake 30 times a day in Palmdale, 45 miles from the epicenter of the original quake. These were all said to be aftershocks. I also experienced the Whittier Narrows Quake in the early eighties, again in Palmdale, but more like 70-80 miles from the epicenter. With that one, as it reached Palmdale, I was reaching for a paint brush on the pegboard in the garage and it moved away from me as if it was personally rejecting me. I reached for it again and again it moved out of the way. That's about the time I felt it under my feet and I turned to look out at the street. What I saws was amazing. The mail box and Italian Cypress down the side of the driveway were shaking back and forth like "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" special effects. There were 10-12 successive waves each 1-2 feet high coming across the desert into the housing tract. The streets, the sidewalks, the houses, our driveway were all rolling up in the air two feet and back down over and over again. EVERYTHING flexed and nothing broke or cracked. The water didn't even splash out of the pool. I still say it defies logic, but you live in Cali long enough and you just come to accept it as normal. My brother and I were going to Volkswagen show in Pomona the morning one of the big ones hit in the San Bernadino mountains east of LA. that one was probably over a hundred miles away from us to the epicenter. It destroyed an electrical substation on the West side of Lancaster. hearing that metal twist and groan and blow apart was quite eerie, even 5 miles away. Hours later, on the outskirts of Pomona, which is closer to the epicenter, we stopped to get gas. A 5 point after shock hit. The ground as I described above but it was only like 3 or 4 waves, but these were closer to 3 foot high. There was a van full of tourists from back East. They were so panicked. It was freaking hilarious to us. At first they were pissed at us for laughing at them, but after we talked to them a bit they were more in awe at how calm we all were, just going about our business as if nothing was happening. Had to got to work in Saugus the morning the big one hit in Van Nuys/ Sylmar in '94. Saugus is about maybe 15 miles from the epicenter of that one. When I got down Highway 14 to where I could see Sand Canyon, all the lights were out and the hills dotted with fires. A few miles to the South is where 14 joins I-5 and it was a very high roadbed above the canyon floor that curved around to merge with I-5. That's the one that collapsed under the motorcycle cop that was killed. That section was already a replacement for the one that collapsed in '71, before 14 was opened. Worked with a guy that was supposed to go work on it that morning. For some reason his alarm clock never went off and he missed his ride with his cousin. His cousin was killed when that first ramp collapsed. He was quite haunted by that, even 15 years later. Even though other than knowing this guy I was unaffected by that quake, that unexplained event is one of the many reasons I'm agnostic and not an atheist.