almost_afraid almost afraid to go to sleep had to evacuate my home today it was yesterday now, the first of march, just before dark now it is lighttime of the next morning, the second day of a new month i haven't slept yet so it still feels like it was today, not yesterday that it happened i was upstairs chillin, listening to some music, thinking/meditating, playin with a flame, burning some incense my dad called me downstairs "there's a really strange smell down here...i don't know what it is" as soon as i started down the stairs i could smell it as soon as i smelled it, i knew i said "it's gas!" "it must be gas!" he tried to convince me otherwise, a dozen other possibilities "no it's this...that...or maybe this" "but no", i said "it's gas" we turned the heat off on the thermostat and opened some windows he freaked a bit "what the fuck this,... what the fuck that,...this is last thing we need" i freaked back "i'm telling you that is what it is, it's gas!" for about twenty minutes or more we were going around the basement smelling everything like dogs, trying to sniff out exactly where the smell was coming from i was thinking the whole time "what if we blow up?" i said "the house could blow up!" i kept trying to convince him it was coming from the furnace room each time i'd go in there i'd smell it really strong,..i nearly passed out beside the furnace at one point it gave me a sharp headache, and after a while it was getting hard to smell anything i went upstairs and talked with my mom. she had come down to smell it after i did but went back upstairs, convinced like me (that it must be gas) we talked for a minute and i went back downstairs to tell me dad "she's calling the gas company" well by this point he'd gotten out the vaccuum to clean the furnace filters, i told him "don't plug that thing in!" but he wouldn't listen,..."i don't hardly smell it anymore" he said "i don't think it's gas" so i searched for and found the cat cages, some were still together, others i had to stop and assemble, setting them in the hallway, i couldn't stop shaking my mom got off the phone and announced what i figured, they told us to leave the house immediately, not to turn any lights or appliances on or off, not to do anything but just to get out of the house immediately at this point i was grabbing the dog's travel kennels from under the stairs when my dad looks at me and starts saying "don't be ridiculous,..this is riduculous...ridiculous...ridiculous" "not ridiculous" i told him "get your head together!! we've got to get the cats and dogs and go" he said i'd insulted him with that and i pointed out the fact that he'd just told me i was being ridiculous "i don't see where ridicule fits into the scene here" i concluded of course we had to get our cats out, and we couldn't just throw them outside (in case they jumped up on the balcony and up to the roof where they like to sit) any other day i could've put those cages together in no time at all, easy shmeazy but frig i was having a hard time getting the doors to go on properly, hands shaking heart pounding i was making a mental note to myself "self,..never let these be taken apart again" so eventually (felt like a long time, but i guess it was only a few minutes) my brothers and i got all the cats in their cages (found the oldest cat in my bedroom throwing up) and sent them next door to our neighbour's house with my mom i grabbed a box of old family photos from my room, saw my fiddle and grabbed it too threw my coat, hat and boots on, grabbed my dogs leashes,.. my brothers let the dogs out of their run in the carport and brought them next door when i arrived at the neighbour's, my mom reminded me about birth certificates in a drawer in the house,.. so i went back for those at the last minute and then decided that was it, no going back in sat in my neighbours yard with the dogs under the moonlight for the couple hours i lost track of time sat there looking through my neighbours window, staring at a mexican painting-turned-poster the neighbours aren't home, one is travelling down south and the other up north, but we're taking care of their house, and they are good neighbours so i'm sure they won't mind when they learn about our camping at their place (it was only last summer we were waking them up in the middle of the night to see the wildfire candling on the mountain ridge) well,.. it took a while but the guy from the gas company arrived, checked around with his special detector instrument thingamabobber, declared it was a problem with the regulator meter vent thingie and intake vent, which basically meant gas and (i guess) carbon monoxide were buidling up in the house it had been thawing outside, but then it froze up again today, and somehow ice and debris caused the problem, something that's never happened to us the scariest part of it all was the fact that I had been upstairs, in the room above where the furnace is, using a lighter to light incense minutes before the smell was noticed,..but, originally i was going to hang out in my room, ..(with incense burning),...and my bedroom is right beside the furnace room,..but, i decided to go upstairs instead, and i'm glad i did anyway, after the problem was fixed (knockin on wood) my mom reminded me about a story she told me once or twice before... a memory from her childhood when she watched a refinery explode and was evacuated from her home i'm almost afraid to go to sleep i'm glad the guy fixed the problem, but i'm worried it could happen again 040302 ... almost afraid i think it's 8 in the morning now just heard the dogs barking, gas guy is back, i guess he is just making sure everything is okay still? 040302 ... almost afraid well he did some reading and took off i think i need to sleep 040302 ... almost afraid frig all my poor telling and spelling 040302 ... crOwl this story reminded me of something t.c. boyle would have written when he was 18. it was both frightening and amusing at the same time. i was laughing but also glad you and your family were alright. hope to hear more from you here at red. i love your style. 040302 ... mon not so afraid anymore well i must confess my ignorance as to who t.c. boyle is, but i'll check him out, thankyou i slept all day but had to keep getting up to smell the air in the hallway just a little scared 040302 ... mon i got some of this a bit mixed up, oh well we didn't open the windows right away . 040302 ... crOwl that's weird i thought you were someone else. now that i know it was you freaks me out. i'm very relieved. anyway, your narrative writing style is very good. 040303 ... mon i often mistake myself for someone else) seriously though, that's cool/interesting that you thought i was someone else really i was in a bit of a strange state when i wrote this, and reading_back,..well i think i could've done a better job if i'd taken more time/effort and been feeling better but i'm glad you liked it) thanks you heartfully 040304 ... monee i keep my window open since this happened 041229 ... monee oh_yes_and_then 041229 what's it to you? who go blather from