Still points in a burning world.
Thank you all for being here supporting my art, and my writing. You have no idea how much it means to me to have someone on the other end of this keyboard reading, appreciating, & maybe laughing.
It’s been a week. Well, two. Well, maybe three – Red Flag wind warnings have started up again, and there is a new fire reported as I’m writing this, in Castaic Lake (now named the Hughes Fire.). This fire season is feckkking relentless. My family and house have not suffered any damage so far, other than the same emotional trauma all of LA is suffering right now. But to that my mom, a lapsed methodist who channels the ghost of a Jewish grandma, would say, “Kinehora! Don’t let the evil fairies hear you!”
The Palisades Fire, the one closest to us, started the morning of January 7, 2025. My daughter left the house to get groceries, but called from the car to tell me there was a small plume of smoke rising above what looked like Woodland Hills, maybe Topanga and to check my apps to see what it was. This plume, by the end of the day, covered a vast portion of the southern horizon, and was joined by plumes to the East and North.
This almost unremarkable little plume reminded me of the start of the Woolsey Fire which we saw the beginnings of from our porch, too. The Santa Ana winds were blowing from the North, and we saw a tiny glow with a little smoke at the top of Woolsey Canyon, near Santa Susana Field Lab, and watched as it became a fire storm. In that one, again we were spared. Kinehora.
Another, the Sesnon fire, started a little North of us. A neighbor called and said “there’s a small fire up by the 118, keep an eye on it.” Within an hour it was burning through our canyon, and into the next canyon where it destroyed several houses. Then the wind shifted, bringing the fire roaring back to us. The hills in the West San Fernando Valley are full of native Laurel Sumac trees, very drought resistant but filled with a resin that burns like kerosene. The fire leapt from sumac to sumac creating 40-foot spires of flames. A flock of about 20 hummingbirds flew ahead of the fire past our house, then firefighters arrived telling us to get out.
My husband stayed, trying to get the sprinklers on, the things you do when you don’t know what to do but need to do something. I started to lose it a bit, seeing the sky-high flames leaning towards him, and asked a standing-by firefighter, in a very freaked-out voice apparently, if I should go get him, as he couldn’t hear me yelling. I think I was also waving my hands quite a lot, I was in a bit of a state. The fireman said so calmly you’d think we were in a café ordering tea and I was making a scene, “What is wrong with you? Why are you panicking? It’s fine. Sure, go get him,” then added, “but be quick.”
Just as the wall of flame got to about 150 feet from our house, a helicopter dropped water on the leading edge, putting the fire out, and the ground crew moved in to put out the embers.
For me, this was a terrifying episode of random elemental chaos with no understandable order. The fire fighters just seemed to be standing around watching it all burn. But, what I didnt realize at the time was they were waiting for most of the fuel to burn out. To them, this was a mathematical and predictable situation with a known outcome. Unfortunately, the Eaton Fire and Palisades fires grew so big, so fast they exceeded even the fire professionals’ icy-calm ability to contain them. Which is why I know, when they say, “Get out now!” they mean it.
Living in a fire zone has had its, perhaps inevitable, influences on my artworks.
Here are a few:
To try to help victims of these fires, I have started a backwards art fundraiser. How is it backwards? Well, most art fundraisers ask you to buy art and then a portion of the proceeds will get donated to the fundraiser. In this one, you 1) donate to a vetted LA Fire Relief Organization (here are some) 2) show me your donation receipt 3) pick out any artwork of equal value on my ETSY shop [dont click the purchase button, the transaction will happen outside of the ETSY portal] 4) I take it out of inventory and 5) I send it to you (you pay usps ground shipping) or come to my (NEW STUDIO!) and pick it up. Plus, 👉 you get the tax deduction.
Link to relief orgs on my Campsite Bio: https://campsite.bio/sarahstoneart
Link to my ETSY Isle of Strays shop: https://www.etsy.com/shop/sarahstone
At about this point I’d be telling you what I’m reading, watching and listening to, but right now the wind is blowing hard so I’m going to tidy up and get ready for the likely possibility that our power (and wifi) may go out again in a little while.
👉 I’ll catch you up next time.
Donate, if you can, to a Fire Relief effort, and above all, take care of yourselves, your pets, your loved ones, and if the fire dudes say “Get Out!” don’t second guess them!
✌️☮️ ❤️🧯