The good news: the young San Diego councilman I’ve known since his pup stage just released a sad and bone-chilling list of homes that have burned down in my evacuated neighborhood–and my house is not on it, they tell me. Bad news: I am not even in San Diego, and despite my normal thick-skinned “it’s-just-real-life-happening” take on these kinds of events, not being there makes it even worse. Somehow, I feel guilty, and for no reason. The last thing I–or anyone else who lives in Southern California–needed was this.
This time the SoCal fires are worse than the ones in late 2003, when on a trip to London, I literally had to drive between rural mountain ridges on fire along Del Dios highway the night before my plane left just so I could stay in a hotel to get to the airport on time–usually a 20 minute drive. It was a bit like being in the escaping-burning-Atlanta scene of Gone With The Wind, except much longer burning and with lower but hotter flames.