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Purification
Sep. 13th, 2015 11:44 pmTwo days ago a fire got started in an area east of Oroville and south of its eponymous lake. I'm not sure just how far that is from my house, but it is way over beyond the lake and several ridges of mountains and several deep canyons. As of this evening it had burned only 525 acres and, despite being in a fairly rugged area, was already about 25% contained. Two other fires, both much larger and faster, are burning on the other side of the valley in Lake County, which has suffered one enormous fire after another this summer. One of these new fires has expanded to some 65,000 acres in four days, and the other to 50,000 acres in two days, so one is nearly 100 times larger than our nearby fire and the other well over 100 times larger.
But I'm sure it was our local fire that kept our air foul with smoke all last night and all day today. The distant fires might have contributed their share to the smoke that created the vivid sunset we observed this evening, but even most of that was probably the result of our fire. It goes by the name Lumpkin fire, so called for a road along which it is burning. It's an oddly quaint and colorful name for a disaster that is consuming some of the most scenic forest in the county.
A cooling trend is beginning, and the breeze is apt to shift around later tonight and blow the smoke south. If it clears the lingering clouds as well then I'll sit outside breathing fresh air and watching the stars unattended by the moon. I might forget about the fires then, and find more distant thoughts, washed by the ocean's waves or the waves of memory.
Some other year I saw clear night sky as summer waned, and never imagined this moment. Now that it's here it will never fully leave me, but it will turn dim and vague. Time folds old things back and conceals them as it opens new views, but sometimes the old things flash quickly back into being like licks of flame on the dark horizon. What is consumed will regrow, and what I will never see will be much like that which I did. I can join the ashes of other burned out things and become part of the anonymous silence of the new forest. What more could I want than such a placid fate?
( Sunday Verse )
But I'm sure it was our local fire that kept our air foul with smoke all last night and all day today. The distant fires might have contributed their share to the smoke that created the vivid sunset we observed this evening, but even most of that was probably the result of our fire. It goes by the name Lumpkin fire, so called for a road along which it is burning. It's an oddly quaint and colorful name for a disaster that is consuming some of the most scenic forest in the county.
A cooling trend is beginning, and the breeze is apt to shift around later tonight and blow the smoke south. If it clears the lingering clouds as well then I'll sit outside breathing fresh air and watching the stars unattended by the moon. I might forget about the fires then, and find more distant thoughts, washed by the ocean's waves or the waves of memory.
Some other year I saw clear night sky as summer waned, and never imagined this moment. Now that it's here it will never fully leave me, but it will turn dim and vague. Time folds old things back and conceals them as it opens new views, but sometimes the old things flash quickly back into being like licks of flame on the dark horizon. What is consumed will regrow, and what I will never see will be much like that which I did. I can join the ashes of other burned out things and become part of the anonymous silence of the new forest. What more could I want than such a placid fate?
( Sunday Verse )
