La fires put what really matters most in focus

By Lauren ADC, special for Calmatters

This comment was originally published by CalmattersS Register about their ballots.

A few weeks after the most difficult year of my life, I dropped out for the summer, I went with my friend Celia back to the Palisadi.

It was my first time I went there from January firesS As we entered the section of the Pacific highway section, which recently opened to the public, I took unimpeded views of the ocean that they were just a few months earlier. Now all the buildings had burned. Surrealism is the only word that describes the experience.

In the end, we headed to the bluffs where the neighborhood gets its name. I, Celia and other friends from the Palisades High Charter, have always been hanging there.

I remember the right last time we met in the bluffs. It was a winter break and I hugged everyone strongly. I said goodbye because I was going to go on vacation with my family. I didn’t understand how much it would have to say goodbye. The fires in LA exploded while we were still traveling. In the flight back, I could understand the flames from my window.

Five of my seven closest friends lost their homes in the Fire of Palisades. We are all scattered in schools and geography. There was a lot of shock. But I think we came out of this more than ever. Fires really put what matters in focus. Supporting each other during this time made us all as a family.

Because of Covid, I had a remote school in the fifth, sixth and some of the seventh grade. For three months after the fire, this was more than those of us who decided to stay in Pali High As much of the campus is destroyed or damagedS That was bad.

But when the school finally Open at the old universal Sears store in Santa MonicaThings are getting worse. The building was hot and overcrowded, and the adults who had to help us made me feel even more stressed.

At that moment, the only thing that keeps me in Pali was my friends, but I was unhappy. When I told them I planned to change schools in the fall to start 11th grade, they understood – several of them had already moved the schools themselves.

As some of my closest friends graduate from the elderly, this year I would come in, knowing that things would change when they were leaving. The fires just accelerated this time line and did everything so much more.

Although my friends and I do not see each other every day, we found ways to stay close. We call, make regular groups of groups, and try to hang out at least once a week personally. That mattered. I know the elderly will not be able to do it next year because they will be in college. But since many of their homes burned down, they plan to return more to help their families move, so we’ll still see them.

I noticed changes in all of us after the fires. Once you have a loss like this, you get a different perspective on life. My man’s friends speak more openly about their feelings. Even the typical “medium” girls, I would say that 90% of them are super nice now. Their houses also burned, so they have all this new perspective. Everyone just had to rethink what was important.

I know I started to introduce myself more. Although it is more convenient for me to stick to my main group of friends, I was hanging out with new people when they ask. I don’t want to take anyone for granted.

While my friends and I do not always raise the fires when we do it, we usually talk about memories from before. Just like when we all went to the beach and had fire, or this time on the bluffs, when my friend Wesley was turning Celia in circles, trying to make her fly, but in the end she just dragged her across the floor. It always made us laugh.

Now the memory has become even more price. I let me remember when I returned to the bluffs with Celia in the summer, a time when the fire could never take.

This comment was adapted by an essay produced for Zócalo Public SquareS

This article was Originally Published on CalMatters and was reissued under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Noderivatives License.