A picture taken shortly before Christmas of ‘24. The cats, thank God, are fine.
Until very recently, readers of Spirit Animal would have been envious of my home bar. Nearly all the subjects of review on this website were purchased in 750ml form, and would come to join what was usually more than 150 bottles in my liquor cabinet or on the various carts and shelves around the perimeter of our dining room.
Just about every article that ever went onto the Spirit Animal website was penned at a desk located in Altadena, California. Night would come, and I’d pour something into a Glencairn or Copita glass, or maybe a Reidel “neat” glass with a big ice cube, and I would type out some thoughts. It would be hard for me to imagine writing in a more comfortable space.
As you might have heard from the news, Altadena is gone. Absolutely destroyed. Burnt to ashes. Not just my home and office, but an entire community.
Each red house represents a loss that is individually unfathomable. Collectively, it’s all the harder to process.
To put this in clearer terms: since the pandemic, my exercise and daily therapy was to go for a walk. My wife and I would normally spend about forty five minutes to an hour just wandering in one direction or another. East and west, north and south.
I thought I knew every house and yard on our walk, but even so, small things would continue to surprise me. A stately tree I hadn’t noticed before. The call of a different bird. A stone lion peeking out at the street from a fence I’d just then decided to pay attention to. It was just too much quiet, everyday beauty for one person to keep track of. I guarantee that whatever you think of “Los Angeles,” you would have been surprised by Altadena if you were able to see it as I did.
A picture from one of my sunset walks.
All of that, and I mean absolutely all of it, is gone. It’s one thing to have your home burn down. It’s another thing entirely to wrap your head around all of that neighborhood beauty and community turning into an environmental hazard for years to come.
The days after
Though I could turn this into a much longer entry, I did want to say this: since it all happened, my wife and I have cried every day—more tears have been shed out of gratitude, however, than they have out of grief. Our friends and family have shown up in droves to provide us with support and kindness. With each phone call, text message, and care package we receive, we look at one another and say, “It’s too much.”
As I entered my early forties, I found myself stricken with a looming sense of dread. I had chosen to become a teacher and a writer. I chose a life that didn’t make me much money, but provided me with a very wonderful existence. But as I saw many of my friends forming a life around them that included homeownership and the kind of salaries that allowed them to obtain good healthcare, I wondered if many of my long-term choices were ill-advised. With all of the physical artifacts of my existence destroyed, and just about all of my hobbies and interests turned into ash, what was left of me?
We’ve heard the saying, “When people tell you who they are, believe them.”
There’s a corollary to that age-old wisdom, and I’ve found myself knee deep in the truth of it. In your darkest and most unsure moments, people will tell you who you are, and you should believe them.
The smallest of texts wishing me a brighter future, or those telling me how much I meant to them, were things that helped me build myself a little stronger and a little taller. I realized, only through this tragedy, just how loved and respected I was. I think, frankly, that if some people knew the full, wonderful value of that gift, they’d burn their house down themselves to experience it.
My stepfather reminded me of a line from Frank Capra’s “It’s a Wonderful Life.” Clarence, George Bailey’s guardian angel, says to him: “No man is a failure who has friends.”
What this means for me, and for the site
In the three weeks since it all happened, I have had people tell me they admire my perspective. As much as I’d like to credit myself with some kind of extraordinary courage or willpower, the truth is that there’s just not many viable options beyond picking yourself up, getting back out there, and putting one foot in front of the other. I suppose I could break down crying in the bushes outside of a Taco Bell until the cops carted me away, but it’s not going to bring my house back or find a new space to land on my feet.
As I pick the pieces back up, I can tell you that Spirit Animal will continue. My output will probably remain, at least for the time being, at about an entry a month.
My philosophy, however, has changed. Many preconceptions I had about my life have been radically altered in the aftermath of this tragedy, but so also has my overall outlook towards stuff in general as well as what we can and should do with the objects and artifacts we buy to connect us (hopefully) with an experience.
This is something I look forward to sharing with you guys in entries to come. Certainly, there’s a lot to talk about. In the meantime, if you’d like to contribute to the site in our time of need and rebuilding, I can tell you that every little bit helps right now. Your donations help us get back to more easily keeping this site running and purchases the very bottles that keep the content pipeline flowing.
