Michael and I spent the weekend in Lake Tahoe, mostly relaxing but also doing a little clean-up around the house. What a huge relief it was to take a walk around first thing Saturday morning and see the river, forest, and sky that I love so much. My demons had convinced me that everything in eyesight beyond my back yard was burned, but in fact my little part of Tahoe is not changed at all. The news reporters had got it all wrong. I read in one report that the fire had burned all the way up Echo Summit and that was simply not true.
The roads are closed around the burned areas, but from the highway you can see the ridge where the fire started. From that distance, the purple and indigo colors above the treeline are hardly different from the charred ridge below, which is dark grey and black. All weekend I kept saying, "I can't believe it's not as bad as I thought it would be," and then I felt huge guilt because there are so many locals whose homes burned and they must think the fire is pretty god-awful. I still think the fire is a huge blow to all of us, but the community will recover. It certainly made us wake up to the need for better forest management.
The irony was right next door to my house when we arrived. There is forest land beside my house and at least five or six huge trees had been cut down in an effort to thin the trees. My neighbor had pointed to them last year and said they were a danger, and it seems the NFS must have agreed with him. Land management practices will probably change, and it's my great hope that there will be a call for volunteers to plant more fire-resistant pines in place of the firs that burned so fiercely. I'm game to volunteer.
On Saturday night we walked to the local bar together with my friends Danielle and Soufi. There was a fantastic band playing and plenty of room to sit. Heaven.
Patrick was sitting at the top of the stairs when we arrived at the bar. He said hello to Danielle and Soufi by name, and then I introduced him to Michael. Patrick handled the greeting with alacrity, and when I talked to him briefly a little later he said he was doing just fine. I hadn't seen Patrick since we split up so I was a little nervous about intruding on him in his element, especially with a new boyfriend. But it's my element too, so I'm glad there was no static. Michael was completely calm throughout, and he even said that Patrick had good energy about him, which was nice.
All in all, the weekend in Tahoe was pretty wonderful. All my fear about the fire was overblown and I'm so very glad. We brought some donations for the humane society and gave money to the fire victims through the IDP, and both agencies said the support has been overwhelming. I'm glad people are doing what they can to help out. I'm really glad that the fire hasn't substantially harmed Tahoe's beauty. We are camping in the Santa Cruz mountains this weekend in celebration of the 4th of July but we'll be back in Tahoe the following weekend.
Note to self, I really need to get the renovation on the other house started if it's going to be ready for ski season. How is it that I keep losing time? I'm kind of worried.
