My Town Was On Fire (Again)

Hello everyone!

Unfortuntately, fire season has taken over California again due to the high winds and dry heat. I’m writing this a few days after the fires were actually close/threatening to me, but by the time you’ll be reading this it will have been over a week. I’m not going to be too specific about the details of my location and the fire for privacy purposes, but I could see the fire from my window on the hills across from my neighborhood. It was never threatening to my house/neighborhood because a big road separates us from those hills, but it was enough to close the roads nearby and give everyone a scare.

Last year, the fires weren’t near my town, but they greatly affected the neighboring town that I go to school in. We had a two week break attached to our Thanksgiving break because of air quality and assessing possible damage to school property, so the whole thing was very serious and very scary. This year, there was no threat to my school (besides bad air quality) since the fire was closer to where I live, but luckily my neighborhood was still safe. My school still closed for a couple of a days, so I ended up having a five-day weekend over Halloween weekend.

I don’t have anything more specific to say about the fires or my experience; luckily my family, friends, and I have all been fine after the events of both years. Watching a helicopter drop the red stuff (forgive me for not knowing the name of it) over the scorched hills from my window just made me realize how sad it is that this is a normalized thing. Every year when the winds get stronger and the last remnants of fall’s heat remain, us Californians have to brace ourselves for fires and tragedy. I know there’s not much we can do since it’s an issue of nature, but it scares me. If any of you live near the fires and if any are still going when I post this, I hope all of you are safe.

-Brooke