San Diego Firestorm

**"* L* B* <S*@cox.net>**

 It's tempting to dramatize my recent experience, perhaps by embellishing
the fact that I have ash under my fingernails (which I do), but the truth is
I spent my two days as an evacuee in complete comfort, watching TV at my son
and daughter-in-law's house in the coastal San Diego community of Ocean
Beach. My husband Jeff and I continually surfed channels and the Internet,
hoping for status reports on our 1,200-home neighborhood, Hidden Meadows
(which is in north Escondido, 30 miles northeast of downtown San Diego). As
it turned out, a lack of wind had defanged the brush fire, and the closest
it ever came was about 10 miles. So no news really IS good news, although we
spent much of our time wondering. 

On the first day of the Santa Ana winds, after wildfires broke out
elsewhere, Jeff and I had gone ahead and packed suitcases and filled our
cars with family memorabilia and anything else irreplaceable. Tuesday
morning's reverse 911 call gave us two hours to evacuate. Yet because of
near-gridlock traffic from our home to Interstate 15, it took half an hour
to reach the freeway, which is normally a five-minute drive. If that sounds
disconcerting, we were never in danger. The exodus used only two lanes of a
four-lane road -- at any time, police or fire crews could have closed the
inbound lanes and made another available. The only thing I wish I had done
differently would have been to update my evacuation list (which is several
years old), and categorized the items on it according to 15-minutes notice,
half-an-hour, one-hour and two- hours-or-more. It's hard to think clearly in
the midst of an emergency, and I did overlook essentials. 

It used to be -- when I was growing up here -- that winds that blew in from
the desert were merely a sign of autumn, like the start of school. Warm,
blustery days were followed by nights during which tree limbs thrashed, like
a storm without rain. Any trees turning color became bare-limbed in hours.
Grit piled up on windowsills and seeped inside. "East winds" (the name
"Santa Ana" came later) preceded winter rains, which used to fall
dependably, if sparsely. I don't recall a defined "fire season," although we
did hear about wildfires. They were usually started by lightning, and
because they burned backcountry brush, they enabled seeds of wildflowers and
other chaparral to pop open and germinate. Nowadays, those same areas are
residential communities that provide the best of both worlds: a country
lifestyle near a major city. Up until recently, there was no deadly
downside.

When Jeff and I arrived home, the air inside as well as out was as stale as
a restaurant smoking section, which is ironic, because such things are no
longer allowed in health-conscious San Diego. Sunlight, orange-tinged, made
shadows blue. Our home's entry porch was an ashtray. As Jeff helped sweep,
he likened the task to cleaning a fireplace. Along the driveway was more of
the wind's mischief: drifts of black grit covered by mounds of dry pine
needles from neighboring trees. To stop soot from being tracked into the
house, I hosed the concrete, creating inky rivulets that fortunately won't
harm the garden, in fact, are probably good for it. I hosed shrubs, too, so
their leaves could breathe, a task that refreshed me as well; the
temperature was in the high 90s. My potted plants had received no water
during several days of heat and zero humidity; the succulents of course were
fine, but the herbs had desiccated. On the sidewalk were paper sacks of
clothing I had set out for AmVets the night before the evacuation. You can
imagine how filthy they are -- I may just leave them as trash.

Thursday morning, when Jeff and I caravanned home on Interstate 15, we
passed Miramar Naval Air Station shortly after President Bush's helicopter
took off to survey the damage. Ten or so miles north, cars slowed where the
freeway bisects Rancho Bernardo. Along with dignitaries in choppers
overhead, we gazed at blackened ridgelines lined with chimneys and colorless
rubble. Each house, like mine, was someone's universe. Every house that
remained standing, like mine, is a testament to the skill of firefighters.
Yet I couldn't help thinking how New Orleans after Katrina must have looked
to this same President -- all those flooded neighborhoods and all that
floating debris. Ninety-nine percent of what he saw that morning was simply
suburban Southern California on a gorgeous fall day -- one that happened to
be a little more hazy than normal.

 A lot of people whose only source of information is TV assume San Diego
County and all its residents have been singed off the planet. My heart goes
out to those whose homes burned, but despite record-setting numbers of
evacuees, 1,600 homes lost, and tens of thousands of lives changed forever,
this was nothing like Katrina -- as the death toll attests. My experience
was typical -- a very good thing, and a good thing to know.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Debra Lee Baldwin

Garden Photojournalist

Author, Designing with Succulents

            (Timber Press, 2007)

www.debraleebaldwin.com <http://www.debraleebaldwin.com/> 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Debra Lee Baldwin
Garden Photojournalist
Author, Designing with Succulents
            (Timber Press, 2007)
www.debraleebaldwin.com <http://www.debraleebaldwin.com/> 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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