The List
We had an exciting day here in Boulder yesterday. Just a two miles from our house a wildfire burned 1400 acres and seven "structures." It started when 80 mph winds blew down power lines. You could see the smoke for miles, smell it too. An entire side of a mountain appeared to glow orange -- we could see it from the end of our street. It's a mountain very close to our house, one we drive on regularly, and one we hiked on just the weekend before with a visiting grandma.
More than 11,000 homes were evacuated along with a lot of livestock. Mostly horses, but I saw a photo of a llama. They brought all the four-legged evacuees to the Boulder County Fairgrounds, which struck me as brilliant, but of course must have been part of the county's standing emergency plan. The Red Cross set up a shelter at a local high school, but in a statistic that illustrates Boulder's wealth, most found friends or hotels: of those 11,000 households, only 75 people spent the night at the shelter.
The news spread quickly, the way it does in disaster situations. People repeated what they knew, what they heard, where it started, how many acres had burned, that no one had been hurt, that a barn had burned down. Because it was clear the fire wasn't close to the more populated part of town where we live, there was a thrill to it all. We were safe, so we could be voyeuristic. I've never seen a wildfire in person, and it was, I have to admit, amazing. All that orange. Humbling. A little bit scary because at the time it wasn't yet contained.
When I was perhaps ten years old we spent a Christmas in Pacific Palasades outside Los Angeles with my father's cousin Steve and his family. My second cousin, Betsy, walked on water. Five years older than me, she was the epitome of teenage perfection. I remember everything about her room, including the fact that she had a list on the back of her door of what she would bring with her in the event that they had to evacuate because of a fire. I'd never heard of such a list. Why would you have to leave your house and bring important things with you? For real? I also remember that a guy who liked her had written a love poem in caligraphy and she had it framed on the wall. Cameron's poem was on the list even though she and Cameron were no longer dating. The existence and beauty of the poem (guys do stuff like that when they like you??), as well the fact that it meant so much even though she and Cameron were over, baffled me. I remember the evacuation list perhaps because Cameron's poem was on it.
Last night I began to think, what would be on my list? Should I make a list? My mind went all other the place: do I want to think about what I'd need for a night away, or what I'd want if my house were gone? Do I want to think about what I could grab and run with, or what I could pack in our car? I thought of only a few things at first, and then put my ideas into categories. There are the papers of a household -- passports, mortgage stuff, tax prep papers, bank records. But, much of that is computerized and can be accessed remotely. There's our computers, they were essential. I didn't think much about clothing, or items in the kitchen. I wondered if it could be handy to have some practical things with us -- how long would we be evacuated for? -- like screwdrivers. My list for M+O was long: dolly and duckling (their lovies), baby books, that file of preschool artwork I've been saving, their favorite dresses and pink sparkle shoes. Things to keep them entertained while we're away from home: art supplies, favorite books, the portable DVD player, Zingo. In the end the personal item list for me was small: our Quaker wedding certificate, photos, some things from my childhood, a few work-related things that would be hard to reproduce, my master's thesis. Could I find a copy of the love poem funnydad wrote for me while we were engaged? And the chargers -- don't forget to grab the chargers for all the electronic stuff I'm grabbing. My thoughts began to be practical, and as I thought and thought, and I couldn't imagine finding enough things I couldn't live without to fill our minivan.
This, of course, is ridiculous. We can fill that minivan for a weekend trip. But it didn't feel like there was that much I couldn't live without. I am absoultely certain it would be different if we were really evacuating and there was a real chance we'd never see this house and our possessions again, but what did it mean that my silver didn't make the list until I decided that was silly, of course I could grab it. Nothing from our garage made the list and very little from our basement.
Does this mean I can donate everything in our garage to charity? Of course not. There's a difference between examining the essentials of life and the comforts that make living easier and enjoyable. I've gotten used to the space and the storage of a quasi-suburban home, and rather like not having my extra sheets crammed into underbed storage boxes with funnydad's old LPs. There's room for improvement, but that doesn't mean I want to take on a life of austerity.
So I spent today thinking about what things are important to me. My girls, my husband, us as a family. Perhaps the presence of sentimental things on my list and absence of many material things means I'm living Quaker values more than I give myself credit for. Or maybe I'm living the values and that's what makes Quakerism attractive to me. Somehow the fire has shown me that it's tied together. And that I'm lucky.
This morning when the smell of smoke still hung in the air and the fire had been 30% contained, neighbors were blasé about it. "Fires are just a part of life here." Really? Well, this was my first brush with natural disaster, unless you count a handful of minor hurricanes. I'm not sure I will ever be blasé about natural disaster so close to home, but it's interesting to learn a few things about myself as I process it all.
What would be on your list?
More than 11,000 homes were evacuated along with a lot of livestock. Mostly horses, but I saw a photo of a llama. They brought all the four-legged evacuees to the Boulder County Fairgrounds, which struck me as brilliant, but of course must have been part of the county's standing emergency plan. The Red Cross set up a shelter at a local high school, but in a statistic that illustrates Boulder's wealth, most found friends or hotels: of those 11,000 households, only 75 people spent the night at the shelter.
The news spread quickly, the way it does in disaster situations. People repeated what they knew, what they heard, where it started, how many acres had burned, that no one had been hurt, that a barn had burned down. Because it was clear the fire wasn't close to the more populated part of town where we live, there was a thrill to it all. We were safe, so we could be voyeuristic. I've never seen a wildfire in person, and it was, I have to admit, amazing. All that orange. Humbling. A little bit scary because at the time it wasn't yet contained.
When I was perhaps ten years old we spent a Christmas in Pacific Palasades outside Los Angeles with my father's cousin Steve and his family. My second cousin, Betsy, walked on water. Five years older than me, she was the epitome of teenage perfection. I remember everything about her room, including the fact that she had a list on the back of her door of what she would bring with her in the event that they had to evacuate because of a fire. I'd never heard of such a list. Why would you have to leave your house and bring important things with you? For real? I also remember that a guy who liked her had written a love poem in caligraphy and she had it framed on the wall. Cameron's poem was on the list even though she and Cameron were no longer dating. The existence and beauty of the poem (guys do stuff like that when they like you??), as well the fact that it meant so much even though she and Cameron were over, baffled me. I remember the evacuation list perhaps because Cameron's poem was on it.
Last night I began to think, what would be on my list? Should I make a list? My mind went all other the place: do I want to think about what I'd need for a night away, or what I'd want if my house were gone? Do I want to think about what I could grab and run with, or what I could pack in our car? I thought of only a few things at first, and then put my ideas into categories. There are the papers of a household -- passports, mortgage stuff, tax prep papers, bank records. But, much of that is computerized and can be accessed remotely. There's our computers, they were essential. I didn't think much about clothing, or items in the kitchen. I wondered if it could be handy to have some practical things with us -- how long would we be evacuated for? -- like screwdrivers. My list for M+O was long: dolly and duckling (their lovies), baby books, that file of preschool artwork I've been saving, their favorite dresses and pink sparkle shoes. Things to keep them entertained while we're away from home: art supplies, favorite books, the portable DVD player, Zingo. In the end the personal item list for me was small: our Quaker wedding certificate, photos, some things from my childhood, a few work-related things that would be hard to reproduce, my master's thesis. Could I find a copy of the love poem funnydad wrote for me while we were engaged? And the chargers -- don't forget to grab the chargers for all the electronic stuff I'm grabbing. My thoughts began to be practical, and as I thought and thought, and I couldn't imagine finding enough things I couldn't live without to fill our minivan.
This, of course, is ridiculous. We can fill that minivan for a weekend trip. But it didn't feel like there was that much I couldn't live without. I am absoultely certain it would be different if we were really evacuating and there was a real chance we'd never see this house and our possessions again, but what did it mean that my silver didn't make the list until I decided that was silly, of course I could grab it. Nothing from our garage made the list and very little from our basement.
Does this mean I can donate everything in our garage to charity? Of course not. There's a difference between examining the essentials of life and the comforts that make living easier and enjoyable. I've gotten used to the space and the storage of a quasi-suburban home, and rather like not having my extra sheets crammed into underbed storage boxes with funnydad's old LPs. There's room for improvement, but that doesn't mean I want to take on a life of austerity.
So I spent today thinking about what things are important to me. My girls, my husband, us as a family. Perhaps the presence of sentimental things on my list and absence of many material things means I'm living Quaker values more than I give myself credit for. Or maybe I'm living the values and that's what makes Quakerism attractive to me. Somehow the fire has shown me that it's tied together. And that I'm lucky.
This morning when the smell of smoke still hung in the air and the fire had been 30% contained, neighbors were blasé about it. "Fires are just a part of life here." Really? Well, this was my first brush with natural disaster, unless you count a handful of minor hurricanes. I'm not sure I will ever be blasé about natural disaster so close to home, but it's interesting to learn a few things about myself as I process it all.
What would be on your list?
Comments
of course, that's a different kind of evac list from the kind you're talking about. like you, i've never lived anywhere where evac plans were necessary for the kind of disasters y'all have out west. if there's a disaster here, there won't be warning. so i have my ready.gov shelter-in-place emergency kit (which lives in your old camp trunk), but otherwise, it's the cats, dogs, and us. shumble into the car and go as fast as we can away from harm.
of course, if they're beside me and i can carry them, my laptop and purse, though. practical.
stay safe,
xoxox
me.