Colby Fire | via Writerly Words
We copied this from our editor’s (K. Andrew Turner) blog, Writerly Words, about the fire in Glendora last week.
I couldn’t think of anything to write about, then I remembered that we had a huge fire this last week. So I’ll write a little about that —though I’ll primarily post pictures. I’ve got a poem in the works about it.
There are quite a few photos. If you aren’t familiar with the story, 3 men had a campfire that went wild. At 6am. In California drought. When it’s been in the 80s for months.
Ash was falling like rain, so I could hear it falling on the leaves in the front yard. I could hear and feel the heat from the flames and this is close, but not that close.
The first three pictures were taken within a few minutes of each other. You could say that I was very surprised to see this as my return from vacation day. Needless to say, it was not a normal day!
Probably not a good thing to stand underneath and stare at when you are starting to get a cold, but it was near impossible not to just stare at the fire and smoke. It’s very mesmerizing.
I think I went inside for water and then was drawn out to watch. It was so interesting to see how precise the water dropping Super Scoopers were.
Once I figured we wouldn’t be evacuated immediately, I ate breakfast. I was hungry, and you can’t just stop living. I was prepared to run up stairs at a moment’s notice to grab my computer, some clothes and run out the door if needed. But food, man, gotta have food.
It was a harrowing morning, but once the immediate danger was over, I completely passed out. I was tired from my awesome Portland vacation and being sick. And the ashy smell I’d breathed probably hadn’t helped.
Anyway, that was my week last week.