FIRES

The day started off with nice moisture relations. My friend Sheryl and I went walking in the park and I saw my friend Lin swimming in the One Mile pool.
I spent the day shadowing another nurse for my new position as a home visiting psych nurse. She and I were coming down from the town of Paradise, watching fuel rich fire clouds headed toward Butte Creek Canyon over the Doe Mill Ridge from Stilson Canyon.
By tonight that fire had crossed the Skyway, the road I show here, and was headed to another sparsely populated foothill road called Neal Rd.
My friend Barb dropped me off at the office and I called Michael and he breathlessly told me he couldn’t talk because he was fighting a fire on the land. I rushed home and was appalled to see a long line of cars and fire trucks on our little country road. On foot I rushed around to enter our property by the creek and slowly began to figure out what was going on.
A fire was started by workers on the Louisiana Pacific rail line, west of us. It quickly spread to the Diamond Match property across from us. Meanwhile, fire had also spread south, along our property line, gobbling up our border trees and dried weeds, spreading into the back orchard and taking out the tip of the property where old oaks have nestled in peace for at least the 28 years I’ve lived here. The people here fought the flames with our hoses alongside the firefighters with their big hoses and expertise. Our fire was pretty safely contained and in ugly, smelly fire ravaged mode within two hours. How quickly things change. At least the people, animals and houses are ok. Hope the people on the ridges fare as well. Right now that fire is 3500 acres!