here's why

i haven't been writing.  i've tried and failed cause, while i've continued my work at the shelter, my heart and mind have been tied up with other struggles, unrelated.

my daughter and her sons were in the first group to be evacuated from one of the wildfire areas in Colorado a few weeks ago.  they wound up having to re-locate three times in three days, as the destruction moved up the pass...as one sanctuary after another was threatened.  they watched the flames roar across the hillside above their little community.  they searched for news of where it was headed, of when they'd have to run, again.  they listened for the reverse-911 call that would tell them to go.

it scares me, even to consider what that was like...

the pressure of having to decide what to save...what was precious enough to be given space in the little car.  so much of meaning in our lives is irreplacable but not necessary for survival and so, is left behind.  is remembered with sadness. for people like my daughter, there's the challenge of trying to remain calm for the sake of the children and at the same time, moving with urgency to collect what's needed for an uncertain future.  

there's the pervasive fear...for your own family, for your friends and neighbors, for the fire fighters. it fills my heart that in the first moments after she knew they had to pack, before the actual evacuation alert, my child took time to run across the road to warn an elderly neighbor.  i couldn't be more proud of the way she handled the entire, extended nightmare...of the strength she found inside herself to deal with a soul chilling reality.

she returned, yesterday, to her home.  the fire came within a quarter mile, but skipped over their little town.  it surrounded them and so she will not be without grief.  for some time, she will face the blackened remains of loss.  and so the questions begin, of how you can...whether you can return to life as normal.  how do you shake the fear?  how do you integrate the experience of helplessness and vulnerability?

in the case of this fire, there is reason to think it was deliberately set, as several smaller ones in the area had recently been started.  how do you resolve, in your own heart, the cold indifference of the anonymous other who held the match?

it brings home to me the fragility of the worlds we've created.  it resonates with the familiarity of wars and natural disasters that beset us frail humans around the globe.  it reminds me, again, of how we are the same in our desires and in our pain.