The L.A. Wildfires: Grieving When a Loved One Loses Everything
I turned 50 the other day. The day before, my big brother called me from his father-in-law’s house in southern California to tell me that he was pretty sure their house was gone.
They moved into this house in Altadena five years ago. Nestled into the foothills of the mountains, the neighborhood was full of winding, tree-lined streets. The homes weren’t huge and showy, but they were beautiful. You only had to walk a little way to get to a trailhead that would take you up, up, up. Bears were sometimes sighted on the streets. From certain points, you could look across the city to see the Los Angeles skyline.
To this Louisiana girl, raised in the flat, boring landscape of suburban Baton Rouge, it was unimaginably beautiful.
Unlike my cluttered mess of a house, theirs was light and airy and full of things they loved, but not in excess. My sister-in-law had shelves full of cookbooks, my brother had a Lego Millenium Falcon that had a place of pride. Their yard had citrus trees and native plants, and climbed up the hillside. Since my brother and sister-in-law are both landscape architects, it was perfect for its setting.
But the next day, on what might have been a joyous day full of old lady jokes, I was devastated to get the confirmation that the fires had indeed taken their home, along with those of all of their neighbors.
It was hard to hear “Happy birthday! I hope you have a great day!” from friends when there was no chance of it. My heart was broken for my brother, my sister-in-law, and niece.
It’s weird to be on this side of a disaster. I hoped my brother would escape as unscathed as we did from Katrina. We had a little roof damage–I would have been okay with that for them. We had hours to decide what to bring with us, they had ten minutes.
But it still feels familiar…like bringing a weekend’s worth of clothes that, in the end, are going to have to last you months. The uncertainty of knowing how your home fared. Watching the news constantly. Knowing you made it out physically, but had to leave a lifetime of memories behind.
That’s what kills me. Two weeks ago, we were all celebrating Christmas together. All of the gifts they received? Gone. It’s silly, but I keeping thinking of the Starbucks mugs I gave my brother that I picked up on my recent trip to Turkey. We both collect them, and try to bring two back from each new place we go – one for each of us. I can collect new mugs and cookbooks, but it never feels like enough.
My brother is five years older than me and he’s one of the best people I know. Definitely the funniest. If I say too much, he will mock me mercilessly, but hopefully he’ll give me a pass this time. My sister-in-law is endlessly kind and generous, and I always feel calmer and a little less like a mess after spending time with her.
The scale of this disaster, which is still ongoing, is so huge that it seems like everyone reading this will know someone who is affected. It’s weird for life to be going on like normal here, when things are so terrible there. I imagine this is how they felt in the aftermath of Katrina.
I hate being on the other side of the country, unable to do much beyond setting up a GoFundMe. But as I watch the donations come in from my friends, my colleagues, people that have never met my brother, the darkness feels a little less overwhelming.