Fires North of Here

Fires are being fought north of here. The years of drought have weakened the trees and dried all the lower vegetation; once the fire starts it races across the hills. San Rafael is only 10 miles to the sea as the crow flies – if you are not a crow it is more like 17 miles. And this evening the wind is coming from the sea, you can smell the Pacific. A blessing.

Yesterday after fires in counties raged north of here 50 to 100 miles away in Yolo, Lake and Napa counties, the sun came up red. The ash in the air mingled with the marine layer to make it look like the beginning of a spooky movie. Two of the fires have been contained, but many more are still burning. But this afternoon the wind has changed direction and and is not as fierce.

This morning the mix of seasonal fog contained a lot of ash. The car was covered.  My car is white so a lot of the ash was not as visible on the body. But the windshield showed how much had landed overnight. The odd shaped spots range in color from dark brown to white and show up when the rear windshield was in the shadow of the very tall trees. So far nobody has died.

Usually fire season in California begins in August – this year we began the fires in June. My fingers are crossed that MarinCounty’s woods will be spared another year – but as the years go by we increase our gratitude for the blessing of fog, wet and cool and a constant answer to the heat of the valleys to the east.