This morning as Rue and I walked the mile on the trail through vineyards from the library to the bone dry Napa River, I realized just how lucky we were. Smokey haze had been replaced with clean air for the first since the Sunday night our fiery ordeal started. Overnight light moist ocean breezes blew the bad air out of the valley. Puffy cumulus clouds dotted the blue sunshiny sky. Up north over Mount St Helena darker cirrus clouds promised rain. The town of St Helena appears to have been spared.
In the mitts of all the devastation I want to share two happy stories. Last Tuesday when Colleen, our friend Mary, Rue and I evacuated to San Francisco we stopped for lunch on Clement St. still weighing our options as to which friends or family to impose ourselves on. I took Rue out for a walk when I came upon a couple embraced in a kiss. I asked, “Excuse me, do you two know each other?”
The lady laughingly said, “Yeah I think so.”
That started a conversation where I explained we came down from the fire. They left wishing me luck. A few minutes later the women came back and gave me her number and invited us to stay at their unoccupied apartment in Berkeley. While I told her we had other options, I was taken aback by their generosity.
Last night we went out to dinner at “Market” in downtown St Helena. A large group of tables in the back were filled with fire fighters that the restaurant had been feeding all week. This was their last night; they were headed home in the morning after ten days of twelve hour shifts. As they stood to leave the patrons gave them a standing ovation. They and the other firemen and firewomen saved our town.
There was a sign on the door that said, “The love is thicker then the smoke.” Indeed.