Fire

By Laurie Niles: It has been a devastating week in Los Angeles, and as I write this, fires continue to burn. I live in Pasadena, two miles south of the Eaton Canyon Fire, which ripped through the community to our north, burning houses, schools, churches, nursing homes, restaurants - everything - to the ground in less than a day. Many of my personal friends have lost their homes. Several of my students found that their schools had burned down. Musicians in local symphonies, including the LA Phil and Pasadena Symphony, lost their homes. Many events are canceled for the moment. The community is in a state of complete shock. I'll share our experience just to illustrate what it was like, because the storm itself felt downright apocalyptic. I emphasize, it was so much worse for my friends who had to evacuate and lost everything. But I still want to illustrate what this was like, at least from my limited perspective. We knew there was to be a major windstorm - we'd experienced this in 2011, when hurricane-force winds blew down trees, blew off roofs, blew up transformers and caused days-long power outages in the Pasadena area. It was spooky and surreal, but we didn't have fire with that storm. That was the big difference. On Tuesday the winds started early in the day, and a terrible fire broke out across town in Pacific Palisades. It was very upsetting, but it was far from where I live. It wasn't until the evening when the winds around us started to howl and the trees swayed wildly. At first, it was just kind of entertaining. We weren't too worried about more than downed trees and branches ("arbage" is what we called it last time) and power outages. We had our flashlights and candles ready. I watched from an upstairs window as a satellite dish on the apartment roof next to ours blew down and swayed precariously from its cable, threatening to become a projectile at any moment. Somewhere in the distance, a transformer blew, in a spectacular blue-pink flash that seemed to light the entire sky. Then the lights went out. Five minutes later - to my surprise - they came back on. Well, thank goodness. But the wind was getting worse, the gusts more acute and frightening, and the air started looking thick. We went outside to see what was happening, and that's when a neighbor started running door-to-door, screaming "Fire!" We peeked around the corner of our building to the north. Oh my god, she's telling the truth, there was fire. It was low on the mountainside, visible orange flames. It was not on our block. However, squinting against the gale-force winds and increasing smoke, I could see why she was panicking - those flames looked like they could be from a building on the next block. They weren't. I was not going to panic; I knew it was several miles away. But it was a very worrisome sight. The black smoke started really pouring from the mountain now - a blizzard of ash blowing straight our way. A huge branch from a tree - big enough to be a tree itself, blew down into the street and then was slowly inched by the gusting wind until it blocked the driveway for our condo complex. My son was driving home from work in all this - which stressed me to no end. We had to move the branch so he could get in. My husband and I pushed the giant branch with all our might - it was SO heavy - wind and smoke and debris swirling around us - until it blocked only half the driveway. Now people could get at least get in and out. It was all we could do - we had to get back inside. When we went inside, we both completely reeked of smoke. We realized we'd better get the masks, if we needed to go outside again. My son got home. He had seen the fire from the highway. We turned on the television, where all programming had switched to constant fire news. We looked at our phones - a very good app called Watch Duty - and we saw that evacuation orders and warnings had been issued for areas just to our north. The border for the warnings was that highway that my son had just been on - walking distance from our place. My daughter called from across town - "Are you leaving? Come stay with us." What would be worse, to stay, or to actually try to drive in this mad storm? I started to pack, just in case. I'd take my violin. My little pet frog Alice - I got a little carrier ready for her. A bag of clothes, medication and toiletries. But I was frazzled, it was hard to think straight and pack. As I was packing, the lights went out again. My stress level went up a notch, it was pitch-black. Where was that battery-lantern? I found it, flipped it on. Tried to concentrate on packing. Should we stay? Should we go? We were not officially in an evacuation zone. But it was clear to me that those evacuation orders might not leave us a lot of time. We'd better be ready. My daughter called again, more insistent. "Just come stay with us!" In our dark living room, we debated. If we went, we'd avoid the highway, go straight south away from the fire. I was in the increasingly panicked "Let's go" camp - and ultimately that is what we did. What a drive - my son drove, my husband navigated, and I sat in the back with my violin and a perturbed little frog. As we turned to leave our driveway, we saw flashing lights to our north - another huge tree had blocked the street in that direction. We went south and we went slow, dodging branches and downed trees. At one point we had to take a detour to get around a tree blocking the road. We took the most confusing and circuitous route on surface streets. We passed over the Pasadena freeway and saw it was gridlocked and at a standstill, and partially blocked. We actually drove the perimeter of Dodger Stadium. We finally reached my daughter and her boyfriend, who were so hospitable. Their roommate was out of town - he let us use his bed. Come morning, the evacuation zones had not changed. Our place was still okay, and neighbors told us that the power had been restored by early morning - to our surprise but great relief. We decided to come back home, despite the still-burning fire and smoke. And indeed it is very smoky, and we've received news that some areas have been ordered not to use the water - we think ours is safe but got some bottled water if that changes. I realized that for so many people, when they packed and left in a panic, they never got to return. What they packed is what they now have, and their homes and possessions are now gone. This is almost beyond comprehension. Shortly after I arrived back home I received an e-mail from the Pasadena Symphony personnel director - giving us the music for the next concert in a few weeks. "It seems surreal to be sending a work-related email when so many are suffering," it said. "For those of you that need a distraction, perhaps some notes to look at will be welcomed." Actually, yes. It is snowing ash here today. But playing music, learning music, just using my brain that way - is a great comfort. I can only hope that my students will find comfort in working on and playing their music as well. Amid so much devastation, these small measures of sanity and normalcy do mean something. Please pray for this community and all the people who have lost so much.