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New York Times reporters have been writing personal portraits about the fires in the California Today newsletter. Here is a collection of their dispatches on what the disaster means to them, and to Los Angeles.
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The Memories That Burn, Too
By Shawn Hubler
Shawn Hubler covers California from Sacramento.
There was a period of my life when I went to Will Rogers State Historic Park all the time. My husband and I would drive to Pacific Palisades and park near the polo field, where they held real polo matches. We would hike past creeks and live oaks, and smell the eucalyptus. Sometimes we would peek into the preserved ranch house where Will Rogers, “the cowboy philosopher,” once lived. That house is gone now, burned to the ground.
Later we settled far to the east, in the San Gabriel Valley. It was a time when everyone was scraping and saving for starter homes. Children in tow, we would while away weekends at open houses, lookie-looing at bungalows and ranch homes. One memorable house had a backyard with an ivy nook that felt like a secret garden, and I still sometimes think of its cool greenness. It was in Altadena, near Eaton Canyon. I suspect it is ashes now.
When wildfires strike, people often talk about lost possessions. The heirloom in the rubble. The family album, up in smoke.
But fires like the ones this week also take landscapes that, when they go, can take a piece of you with them. As flames spanned Southern California, I thought of lost backdrops. The destroyed cafes where people wrote screenplays. The burned bleachers where teenagers shared first kisses. The park where my husband and I once held hands and smelled the eucalyptus, and, in a place that is now just a memory, were young.
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