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A Season of Fire I live at 8000 feet elevation in the Southern Rocky Mountains. Serious snow country, except it hasn’t been that way lately. Both snow and rainfall have been getting markedly less for the last four years. This winter was like no winter at all, except that it was cold. Each new winter we expect a huge snow pack because of the dry preceding spring and summer, but it does not come. After this year’s non-winter we went into a spring that was also exceedingly dry and windy. With lakes and rivers frighteningly low, and water wells going dry, all but the most unconscious residents are very aware of dangerous drought conditions. As we now enter the summer season a strong and consistently hot wind blows in from the west accelerating the drying process. As much as we all love sunny days everything from our skin to our lawns knows conditions are much too dry. I wake up this morning with the stark realization that I am living in a forest that is dying of thirst. At my meditation spot each morning I can literally feel a building edge of agitation in the surrounding forest and among all the different creatures: elk moving very early to the high country, deer sticking close to houses and streams, birds less in number and noise, bear more aggressively trashing the garbage cans. At this point I am thinking the question is not if there will be a fire, but where. Everyone can feel it coming, sooner or later. Fire Contact Outside working this afternoon looking west I suddenly saw a huge black plume of smoke rising out of the distant mountainside. With a bolt of concern shooting through me, I climbed to a high point noting uncomfortably how my recent expectations were confirmed. I figured the fire to be around 5 miles away - ‘as the crow flies’. I also knew the fire now happening 180 miles north in Glenwood Springs was traveling up to 3 miles an hour! There are many obstacles it would have to jump to get here (a river, treeless meadows, cliffs, etc) but with enough wind I thought it could do just about anything. I reassure myself that so far we are fine, but it’s all about the wind. Our fate rides on that - as usual.
Late in the afternoon with our friends, under huge plums of gold, orange, brown and white clouds churning up through a cobalt blue twilight sky, we sat amazed, awed and scared. It’s a wild, dangerous, and gorgeous beast this fire. We watch and we pray while it works its way across the mountains we love. Later in the evening we drove north over the hill to the Florida River Road. Lines of cars and trucks with belongings in the back were heading out. Flames were cresting the ridge above the road leaping into the air and heading downhill. It seemed so powerful and so unstoppable. Fires usually travel fast up to the top of ridges and then stall out there because they don’t move down hill well. This fire is going down hill about as fast as it goes up because of a very dry forest and a big push from the hot wind. The moisture level of the trees now is around 15% -17%, which is about the same percentage as kiln dried lumber! In the mornings I sit out at the sacred site meditating. On many such mornings I pray and feel quite connected, very “heard” by the universe - like some huge receptive ear has been turned my way. However on these last few mornings when I pray for a positive result from the fire it feels about as effective as pissing in the wind. “It” is on the move and my concerns hardly matter. I pray any way. Today orange shadows, red sun, and yellow haze seem stuck to everything I see. It’s a hot summer day with no blue and no sun. Everything bathed in different shades of grey as far as we can see in all directions. Yesterday’s inspiration disappears into dull resignation as we drive to view the destruction in the mountains just to our north. The fire is bigger and has gone farther than we thought. A huge burning line now sweeps across the mountains heading into Vallecito Lake. Police, fire, ambulance, electrical, and forest crews hanging, talking then moving everywhere. Uniformed military guard the closed roads. The high school is full of Red Cross and people who have been forced to evacuate. With almost 2000 people now forced to evacuate the parking lot is full of cars, trucks and campers jammed with belongings.
This the first Class One fire ever in the San Juan Mountains. That makes it a federal thing and we now have more resources to fight with – something like 1000 fire fighters, four slurry bombers, 7 helicopters, etc. Control of the fire has been taken over by the Southern Command. I appreciate the job they do to coordinate what is now a massive complexity. While at first glance it looks like the fire has now passed us by going north east, I look to the north west and see an ominous cloud of dark smoke boiling up over the ridge. The wind is blowing hard straight toward us from that direction. I suit up to do another round of cutting and clearing. Each tree surrounding our house looks like a matchstick to me now. As I cut huge branches too near the ground I marvel at how little they weigh. Their moisture content seems about zero, though we are told it is 10% - 15%. That this is the moisture level of kiln-dried lumber easily keeps me hustling. Our sense of urgency builds, as does the wind. In the mornings our mood is kind of like “well, it’s not that big a thing, we’re pretty cool”. In the evenings with the wind howling it’s the opposite. This morning we awake to a haze so thick it reminds me of a Southern California beach in June. Max visibility is something like 100 yards. Everything smells like smoke and burn. The fire is now on two sides of us - both north and east and is essentially two fires. After a half hour drive we are out of the “fog” a find ourselves in a bright blue Colorado day. As we drive back into the war zone we still think we will be OK. Fire Solstice Summer Solstice four years ago we moved into our house. As the solstice now approaches four years later we wonder if that will be the day we have to move out. No bird sounds happen in the mornings when I meditate out on the point. Their pre-dawn chirpings used to fill the air. Firemen nearer the fire report birds just falling out of the air dead on the ground. Again today the smoke is so thick I can barely see Phil and Lucy’s house next door. Nor can I stay long because breathing is uncomfortable. Everyone here is packing, but no one is leaving. The fire is about 3 miles away to the north and, while it has slightly died down, any big wind change could bring it our way fast. The fire to the east is raging and has already consumed many houses in the Vallecito Lake community. Dean and Linda’s river house is definitely in danger. The fire to the west has exploded into a whole new dimension as it threatens to come off the ridge and into the Animas River Valley. Yesterday the head guy from the Southern Command said, “You folks live in a area which is fire dependent and fire dominated.....it’s always been that way.” I could feel those words in my bones. Fires MUST happen here. Yet they have been actively suppressed throughout the West as more and more people built homes in the forest. This has allowed fuel levels to dramatically build. The result is when fires come now they come bad. Information he gave: Reports from the firemen: In addition to flames 200 to 500 feet high and plumes of smoke rising to 20,000 feet, the fire is generating “vortices” (tornado-like funnel clouds) 200 yards wide and 1000 feet high. These vortices, with 100 mile per hour winds, sweep down, turn over cars and jerk up huge trees. Interestingly, the space of ground they actually touch is left unburned because they sucked out all the oxygen. In addition to something like eight slurry bombers we now have eight helicopters on the scene. Some of these can dip down to a lake, pick up 2200 gallons of water in 45 seconds, carry it up to 9,000 or 10,000 feet, dump it and keep going like that over and over, all day long. The Southern Command is a “Type I” fire team, meaning they handle the highest levels of wildfire complexity. Over many years the leaders have done this work in almost every state. They say they have never seen Emergency Response Teams and Fire & Rescue Departments so on top of things. We of course like to hear this and think it is quite consistent with the spirit we feel almost all the time around here. The whole community is really involved: Evacuees sleeping in the high school gyms; fire fighters camped in tents out on the high school lawns; drop stations for fire fighter needs (socks, mole skin, sun screen, energy bars, hats, gloves, etc.); grocery check-out clerks volunteering on the hot line before work; hand written signs all over the place on mail boxes saying “Fire Fighters - Thank you - We love you” . Ominous Weather report: Thunder clouds with lightening, but no moisture. Head fire guy: “No human being is going to stop this fire.”
We’ve been running on adrenaline for a week now. Nerves and patience are shorter now. So is energy. We are tired of smoke, confusion, dryness, and seeing our beautiful country side burned. We are also quite OK and hope to remain so. We have received an unbelievable number of calls from people offering to help in any way possible and sending their love. We usually have no requests except to say we deeply appreciate and thank you for your generosity and caring. We are letting go, accepting, working hard and keeping the faith. Everything is perfect, we just need to keep finding it in each moment. In the midst of the smoke and grey and chaos all our flowers are in bloom and our friendships flourish. Fire Night It’s 4:00am. It’s hot. I can’t sleep. Nor can I relax. Comfort with myself has escaped. Maybe it’s “the fire”. Yet at this point the fire is only in my head, in my body, in my energy. Seems like I exist these days in a vague state of continually happening emergency. I go outside. Usually I sooth myself back to sleep lightly bouncing in the hammock and looking up at the stars. But tonight the ever present smoke cloud pushes down like a compressive force. There are no stars, little air flow, no feeling of space and it’s too smoky for comfortable breathing. Soon I am back inside. My general discomfort continues. It’s hard to get away from these days. Most every day there is some kind of concern or emergency. Yesterday we made a dash up to Dean and Linda’s home on the River above Vallecito Lake. They have not been in there since the fire first started. To get in there we need special permission, an escort by the Sheriff, and can only stay a very limited amount of time. They want us in and out before noon when they expect the fire to kick up. A fire moves like a capricious worm as it flows through the forest. As we drove through the mountains up to and beyond the lake we marveled at how some places, too many places, were burnt like toast. Just total destruction. Power and telephone poles down and burned, lines laying all over the place, bare black stalks of trees poking up out of charred earth. Yet for no apparent reason other places looked like no fire had ever happened. Still others were some where in between: fire had come through on the ground but not in the trees, small trees burned, big trees were unaffected. As we looked across the landscape of the mountain sides we would see stripes of all this: one swath of total destruction, another section healthy and untouched, then another moderately burned. Moderately burned is probably the optimum result because the forest is too dense and needs thinning. As I have said, periodic fires have always been a fact of life in these areas. This is how nature cleans up after itself. Fires sweeping under the trees and cleaning out the underbrush and less healthy trees contribute to the vitality and safety of the whole region. However when that does not happen for many, many years, as is now the case, fires get much more intense and destruction increases. We hustle out of the area with four pick-up trucks of loaded belongings. It’s another one of those days: around 95 degrees, single digit humidity, no clouds anywhere in sight, a smoky haze hanging over everything and everywhere. It’s just the kind of heat where everything is edgy, impatience is high, emotions are short, you want some kind of break. After we unload, late in the afternoon I drive back into town. Exhausted I see ominous dark clouds of smoke rising up over town. Yesterday the fire really exploded on the ridge north of town and I imagine it happening there again. As I drive further I see it across the highway on the complete other side of the Animus Valley .....and just really booming. Again I am in the now familiar sights and sounds of huge black clouds churning up through the sky and new notices for evacuations coming in over the radio. Other friends living in that area had seemed pretty cool and out of the danger area. Now they are in the middle of it. In the morning we had driven all the way up north to the far eastern edge of the county to evacuate Dean and Linda’s house. I am now miles and miles away on the western side and the fire is here too. Yet now it is down in the valley not just up on the ridge. I see huge flames leaping up through the smoke as fire trucks scream through town and long lines of cars to form hoping for a chance to get back home. Later they close off the highway. Other friends have to evacuate. Still others are on alert that they might have to. I drive home through the mountains just to our north where the fire still goes on and head into our immediate area. The trees here look so vulnerable, so in need. The afternoon light is now a heavy grey pall, like a Bladerunner scene, like a dark winter day about to snow....only it’s 90 degrees. I call friends to see who needs help. My friend Geoff has a beautiful log house down by the river in the Animus Valley. It was built and lived in by the first sheriff of La Plata County in the 1800’s. Geoff was told four or five days ago to evacuate. Apparently they can’t make you go. If you choose to stay you are on your own. If you come out for supplies they don’t let you back in. If you force your way back they arrest you. Geoff is still there. No power, back up generator, cel phone, low food, holding all the water he can. Fire Energy I send out e-mail thank you’s everyone for all the prayers, love, offers of help and accommodations we have received. The fire is still very dangerous, but things have calmed for us as the southern edge of the fire died down. The eastern and western edges are quite a distance away. However the overall fire is still intense and we have friends whose homes are quite threatened. And as usual it all depends on the wind. Even though we haven’t been evacuated or anything even close to that, our life still seems like it was turned totally upside down. Business communication stopped, our trip to Hawaii canceled, and everything became about the fire. Everywhere I look the house is a mess or in some state of disarray. It must seem really that way for the people who had to evacuate their homes, live at the high school, camp out, or stay with friends. We feel kind of dislocated and jacked around at times, but I can only wonder what it must be like for those people who have lost their homes. So far something like 1800 homes have been threatened by the fire and had to be evacuated. I think only around 45 have been lost. But still for those people who lived in those 45 homes.... We had a thunder shower yesterday which really helped cool things off and change the general mood. I think every animal, tree, bush and insect breathed a deep sigh of relief. The effect on the fire had to be calming, but I doubt it changed much in the overall sense. On the way home from town yesterday afternoon I happened to find myself in a literal procession of fire trucks heading out into the mountains. At the same time long lines of other fire trucks passed us returning back into town as they came out of the fire areas. Happily I was caught in a kind of changing of the guard. All along the road, as I have said before, were signs of thanks and appreciation, but the most amazing thing was all the people who came out of their homes to wave and cheer as the trucks drove by. Some of the narlyest dudes were out there just looking for all the world like little excited kids with big smiles waving encouragement to their firemen heroes. The whole scene just brought me to tears. The highs and lows of this event are amazing. The other day I had an experience of seeing the fire as just new energy which had come to town, energy that had churned us all up into a much more excited state. Energy that produced action and rich feeling and communication and deepening friendships and cooperation and sounds and hauling and packing and pulling and raking and cutting and slurry bombers and helicopters and big trucks and uniforms and hard work and new stories and new challenges and phone calls and e-mails and amazing beautiful clouds and people donating goods and volunteering services and on and on. The whole event changed for me from seeing it through the eyes of ‘something is wrong’ to seeing it as some kind of wonderful infusion of new life into our area. Our Main Man from the Southern Command keeps reminding us: We live in a fire universe. We live on a fire planet. We live in a fire state. It’s always been this way. Better learn to get used to it. 366 fires started in the U.S. on Thursday, 80 the day before, 66 the day before that. Each day a few of those become big ones. Fire fighting resources are becoming increasingly thin. Maybe with the War on Drugs, and the War on Terror, and the War on Poverty, (and lately the war on our civil liberties) what we really need is to declare a new war - the War on Fires. Nothing can get resources and real funding until we put it in the “War” category. The energy in our forest is like a wild animal stomping around out there going wherever the food is. It will eat awhile, rest, wander around, then really get excited about something, then rest, then wander, etc. No energy this big has been in here for over a hundred and twenty years. During this time its food has just been getting thicker, richer and more plentiful. The energy is so big you can’t kill it, you just keep trying to herd it into areas where it’s not going to eat up people’s lives. In my life every time an experience comes along like this which shakes me to my foundation, when it’s over I pray that I have learned to keep the faith longer and stronger for whatever comes next. I pray that in the process of taking whatever action is required my perspective will be one of deeper faith in the overall process. Amen Brother! And this morning the birds came back. |
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