F is for Fire

I love you LA.

Hiiii. I’ve missed you. And me.

If you know me then you know I have devoted most of my life to creating spaces for us to feel safe- safe enough to feel, to fall apart, to find solace in not having all the answers; spaces where our perfectly flawed, fallible, fabulous selves can breathe and grieve and laugh and scream in good company.

Writing and sharing has always been a way through for me. The words you’ll find here are never about content but connection.

Connection is my medicine. My hope is they help you feel a little less alone.

So, I had big thoughts and big ideas about alll the various F words I would use to jumpstart this intimate space with you. Fire was not one of them. And well, here we are. I love you.

---

F is for Fire 

I drove my four-year old son to preschool the other morning.
Schools had cautiously reopened. 
I wanted to give both him and his 
sister a semblance of ‘normal’- 
whatever that means in a world on fire. 

We park and walk in. 
That’s always been our thing. 
Our morning walk. 
We search for ‘treasures’- a stick or a stone.

We see a fallen tree branch
twice the size of him.

“Mama?"

"Yes, love."

"Was this from the winds
and the fires?” he asks.

“Yes, love.” 

We negotiate over why we must leave the branch,
and why we can’t carry it into the school yard.

We stop to check on 'birdie'
living in the street sign.
She pokes her little head
out of her nest. 

“Mama, she’s there! 
She’s in her home!”
Our excitement and celebratory screams 
force her to fly away. 

Birdie in her home

---

Parents we rarely get to see or speak to 
stop to check on each other; 
holding what feels like a balance
of heaviness and hope,

“You guys okay?” 

"We’re okay."

But most of our friends aren’t.

I give my son an extra tight squeeze before I walk out.
He’s excited to wear his mask. 
He’d seen pictures of his older sister wearing hers
during Covid when she went to this same school. 

His eyes beam a sense of pride,
“See, I’m just like her.”

He’s unaware of the grown-ups above him, 
looking at each other - some masked, some not- 
all of us muttering in disbelief, 
“Masks, again? Really?!”

I blow him another kiss, and
I make my way to where we’d parked.
Birdie’s back home in her street sign.  

I get into the car and the navigation screen pops up. 
I see it prompting me to head “home”,
with a map of the Palisades directly beneath it.

I begin to sob. 
I sob a much-needed sob for my friends, 
For my family of Angelenos. 
For those who need to delete ‘home’ 
from their navigation apps.
‘Cuz even our cars remember where home was. 

Trauma and grief-
They disrupt our compass. 
They short circuit our navigation systems. 
Home is no longer where it was.

Someone better let Siri know. 

Let her know that home was never a location- 
but all the proof of life and love that filled its walls. 
Explain to her that home 
for now 
rests (where it always has)
Right here, wherever we are. 

Explain to her that home f
or now 
rests (where it always has)
In the soft, dependable steadiness of friends
In the kindness of strangers.

All of them holding us, 
giving our broken compasses direction;
Carrying our hope on the days 
when even hope feels heavy.

Explain to her that home 
for now
rests (where it always has)
In the arms and hearts
of all of those around us-
Proof that even after the fire, 

love always remains.

I take a deep breath
and reach for another Kleenex.
I blow my nose.
I wipe my eyes.
And pull away from the curb.
  
I wonder if Birdie
will be there tomorrow.

---

Take care of each other,

Az xoxo