A year on...

So it's been just over a year since the earth below our city roared into life.

7500 aftershocks and still counting, crazy.

Things are slowly normalizing - the sewers are fixed and the portaloo has disappeared from outside our house, the kids haven't had any 'earthquake days' off school this term and some of the families we knew who left after February have started to move back to Christchurch.

And the shopping malls on this side of town are opening again!  

Now I'm no mallrat - I don't particularly like malls, in fact I would lean towards being socio-ethically (I just made that word up) against them but they are so damn convenient.....with little kids....in the wintry rain...with a list of jobs to get done....parent's room and toilets close at hand....you get the picture.

Our roads are still crappy though - holes and raised manhole covers everywhere - you can tell the cars who live down our street by the way they swerve through the least bumpy path on the road like it's 2nd nature.

In general I don't feel anxious about the earthquakes anymore - which surprises me really, given my history of anxiety and depression.  I know some people who can't go into shops still or who can't leave home on Tuesdays because that's when the big one happened.  

I still have moments when I am terrified that we are about to have another big one and I run through the scenario in my head on how I would get my family all safe, back together.  And then there are the times when Erin is playing nicely on the floor and I suddenly have to scoop her up and hold her tight because I have just noticed all the things that could fall down and hurt her.

But generally these things are happening less and less.  

Everyone is more settled and hope is sneaking it's way in.

The water still tastes like a swimming pool though!