Landmarks in ashes, and of memory, confront fire victims in a traumatized Ventura
Two weeks after the Thomas fire, nearly everyone in Ventura has a story to tell. With more than 500 homes lost and 27,000 residents evacuated, no one is a stranger to this disaster.
They turn to one another in restaurants and diners, checkout lines and the post office and share their stories as if words could lay a foundation for their new lives.
Initially they asked, “Did you lose your home?” Now it’s, “How are you doing?” in an understanding that possessions matter less than concerns of the heart.
They reply with expressions of solace and are surprised at how banal words sound in the aftermath of such devastation. So they speak with gestures, bringing to ordinary interactions — turning left, queuing for coffee, greeting one another — a courtesy and patience that had gone missing from their lives.
The residents of Ventura know they are lucky. Their city did not become another Santa Rosa with its myriad tragedies, but then again, they also know that not everyone in Ventura is feeling especially lucky.
For the families who lost their homes, the slow accounting of their new lives has begun without the familiar landmarks. Trajectories changed, priorities upended, they toggle between past and present, caught between old habits of reference and the world they now inhabit.
They believed they would be safe. They never imagined a fire like this would darken these December blue skies.
http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-ventura-trauma-20171219-htmlstory.html
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