Fire, Fire!

I was getting ready to leave work the other day when my phone rang. "Are you on your way home, Honey?" Sam asked.
"Just leaving now. Why?"
"Our hills are on fire. You might not be able to get up our street, so you'd better hurry home."
"Okay."
"But be careful."
"Otis' cat carrier is on the top shelf of the garage, if you are going to be evacuated in a hurry."
"Okay."
"I'm on my way."
"Right."
So this is what I saw as I turned off the freeway and headed up the boulevard toward our house.

About eight fire trucks passed me on the way up the street, sirens blaring. Indeed our hills were on fire. The wind had turned to the northwest and the fire had already eaten up all the vegetation on the hills behind our house. It was now moving toward the community college at the end of our subdivision.



The Channel 9 News van was at the corner of our street and helicopters raced back and forth over our house: down to the pond in the golf course where they sucked up water, and then up to the fire to pour it over the flames. Kids and parents lined the golf course, watching the helicopters lower the spickets into the water. I was just worried that they might suck up an unsuspecting duck that lives down there on the water's edge.


As it got dark, the sky looked ominous. It would have been much worse had the wind been blowing the smoke toward us. But it was a clear evening and I could sit on our balcony and watch the planes dropping flame retardant on the fire, and the busy helicopters buzzing back and forth. It sounded like a war zone. Heavy equipment droned up the hill toward the fire where firemen dug up a 20 foot wide swatch of fresh dirt to impede the spread of the flames. We could see sillouttes of firemen up on the ridge. People lined our street watching the fire and taking pictures of the odd colors in the sky.


In Southern California, so many people have lost their homes or have been evacuated in the dead of night. We are thankful that "our" fire was contained by nightfall. The next morning there was a layer of fine ash over our cars in the driveway. A few areas on the hill had ethereal smoke patches, but that was all.

This is what our hills look like today. Poor, baren, charred things.
Authorities caught the 16-year old who set the fire, and incidentally, two or three other area fires that resulted in considerable loss of property. I hope he is dealt with properly and swiftly. Meanwhile, our neighborhood is peaceful once again. We are very grateful, even while another fire just got started up on Cajon Pass tonight, about 20 miles from us. It is all part and parcel of living where we do.

Bienvenido Maestro!

The Los Angeles Philharmonic has a new conductor, whose innaugural concert is playing as I write these words. He is a 28 year-old Venezuelan Gee-whiz kid. Another Mozart type. But most engaging and entertaining to watch. He started out his career in Los Angeles by conducting a group of young inner city children playing in an orchestra formed only two years ago. They screeched and sawed, a bit out of tune. The parents were straining to see and hear their little ones, and you could see lots of tired hard working faces of laborers in the front section where they were seated as guests of honor. Most of the children were Latino, and the fact that Gustavo is, too, made the crowd go wild. Particularly that he would give his first attention to the inner city children of Los Angeles. The place went wild when he walked onto the stage of the Hollywood Bowl.

Then, Gustavo conducted the L.A. Philharmonic performing Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. From memory. It is one of the best renditions I"ve ever heard, and certainly one of the most excitingt ones. He tends to play with the orchestra as he conducts, bowing and mincing at times when the orchestra plays marching tune portions. Other times, he looks a bit spastic as he conducts with short shaky jabs of his baton. But as I commented to Sam, his hair is what makes him a fabulous conductor. It bobs and shakes long after his body stops moving. To see a bald conductor isn't terribly exciting, but what this guy's hair does as he gesticulates and weaves back and forth. Particularly during the loud sections with drums and loud chorale passages, and of course, Beethoven's Ninth has plenty of this!
At the end, he addressed the crowd first in English, then said in Spanish, "I understand that some of you here speak Spanish." The crowd went wild. He continued in English and said that he was so proud to be an American. It was terrific. At the end of the concert, the applause went on for a good 10 minutes, bringing him and the soloists back to the stage time and time again. As he left the stage for the last time, he stooped down to greet some of the young kids he had conducted earlier in the program. What a role model, and what a thrill to have him recognize them. You know that the inner city of Los Angeles will be pressing over into the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion and the Disney Concert Center to hear him every time they can.
Let Los Angeles have music!