November 19, 2008

• On the Other Side..........

  Most of you have heard about the terrible fires that were burning in Southern California. Our house was a half a mile from those fires in Brea. We voluntarily evacuated on Sunday morning due to really poor air quality more than anything.  We have a son in Yorba Linda that was under a mandatory evacuation and was safely moved to Costa Mesa. Doug was working on Saturday night and I thought I was going to have to evacuate myself that evening but fortunately the winds moved the fire in another direction and I didn't have to. People have asked me if I was scared and I really can't say that I was. Tense and alert, yes, but not scared. I put gas in my van, gathered up all our pet crates, pet food, litter boxes, heat lamps, leashes, put my purse and an overnight bag in the van and was ready to go at a moment's notice. In watching the news I saw the people were packing up as much as they could; pictures, documents, clothing, etc. I looked around and thought of all the precious things to me and all I really knew I couldn't replace was my pets. The rest is all material and quite frankly I would have appreciated it if my bills had burned! hehehehe I think being so close to death myself this year helped put it all in perspective. You can't take it with you when you're dead anyway, so is it really worth anything? We had alread lost everything once this year so to possibly loose it again didn't bother me. I've learned how quickly it can all go and am reminded that what I have really isn't mine anyway, it's just on loan to me for this life time. The only thing I would have truly missed was my kid's baby pictures, but they were burried so deeply in the garage that it would have made it harder to get out. On Sunday morning I woke up and had a hard time breathing and had a splitting headache. It smelled so badly of smoke that it felt like we were outside and I knew it couldn't be good for any of us so we packed up our German Shepard, Black Lab, 2 cats, kitten and 2 snakes and headed for Seal Beach where my boss lives. She's out of town and let us use her place till the air cleared. So on the other side we are, happy and healthy and once again thankful.

  • 4:35 pm
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