Fires and hope

The fires down here are still out of con­trol, des­pite small amounts of rain. Latest death toll is 108, and that’s not count­ing he many bodies that will pre­sum­ably sur­face when the fire­fight­ing stops. Many of the fires, it’s said, were lit by arson­ists. Two towns are entirely gone, at least one a beau­ti­ful old coun­try town that now has only one build­ing stand­ing. One friend’s mother has lost her house, car and busi­ness in that town. Our doula’s house­mate’s family is in hos­pital and her father is miss­ing, pre­sumed dead.

Still, there are some amaz­ing stor­ies: a family whose daugh­ter lives in Paris is emailed by a friend that her par­ents are safe. She emails the news out to others, includ­ing inform­a­tion that neigh­bours are with them. Another friend in Hol­land gets that email and hap­pens to be listen­ing to ABC radio stream­ing online. The ABC broad­casts a call for info that Charlie and Betty from Buxton are safe. Dutch friend emails Parisian daugh­ter who phones the ABC and assures them that Charlie and Betty are with her par­ents… The world is smal­ler every day. MP3 of the call.

I’m think­ing of gath­er­ing up my mater­nity clothes I no longer need and donat­ing them to people who’ve lost everything. And some of the excess baby stuff we’ve received through free­cycle and don’t need.