Commemoration and Celebration

A busy, reflective, celebratory weekend.

Friday was the ninth anniversary of the Tubbs Fire, which destroyed my home and about 5,000 others, so we had some feelings about that. At the same time, on Saturday, Karen and I helped open a new park in our neighborhood that was the culmination of years of hard work. The two events are related.

A look at part of the park, which I shot from atop the highest piece of playground equipment. It's a really nice playground, with a lot of natural wood, and metal painted in primary colors. It was paid for by an organization called the Saba Foundation and supplied by Park Pacific and Columbia Cascade; they all consider it a model that they can point to as an example of their best work.

A look the opposite direction at the rest of the park. It's hard to see what's going on, but the tan umbrellas toward the center rear are shading six picnic tables. The dirt patch at center that most of the people are standing on will soon be grass, and a concrete pad for the future gazebo is off-camera to the right. The white canopy shades one of four tables set up for a silent auction, which offered 22 donated items (including a signed copy of my graphic novel "A Fire Story") to help raise funds for the park. Our daughters Robin and Laura came to help run the silent auction, as did my sister-in-law Cathy and brother-in-law Marc. All in the family! 

The park's origin story: before the fire, it was a preschool on an acre of land. After the fire, its owners relocated the preschool, put the land up for sale, and got an offer from a developer who wanted to fill the acre with a massive apartment complex. Karen helped form a nonprofit organization with the goal of turning it into a park instead, and the land's owners said they'd be happy to sell it to them if they could match the developer's price.

Years of work followed. Karen was instrumental in raising funds and negotiating agreements. You would not believe how hard and expensive it is to build a park. You think, "What's the problem? Just roll out some turf, throw up a playground, and BOOM! Instant Park!" Not even close. Permits, soil engineers, water engineers, utilities, contractors, subcontractors, inspectors (did you know there are professional playground inspectors?). It would have been easier and faster to build the apartments. Every step was a struggle for a scrappy nonprofit that was basically just eight or nine motivated volunteers, none of whom had built a park before. 

The nonprofit board introducing themselves and giving thanks and credit where it was due. The park project wouldn't have been possible without a ton of people and businesses that provided material and services for free or at cost. That bare dirt underfoot will be covered in a woody mulch (also donated by a local business) very soon. 

Saturday, the park opened. It's not done yet--it still needs a lawn and a lot of landscaping, plus there's a longer-term goal of building a gazebo that'll take money we don't yet have--but it's safe and fun. We threw a big fundraising gala with speechifying dignitaries and a fundraising auction. The preparation and work that went into the event itself was enormous. Exhausting. Sleep-depriving.

And it was a huge success! The weather was perfect. We figure a couple hundred people came, and the auction raised way more money than anyone expected, greatly due to the auctioneering skills of our special guest, California Senator Mike McGuire. Best of all, the park actually had kids playing in it! 

Karen, state Sen. Mike McGuire, and county Supervisor James Gore. Karen knows them well; before McGuire was elected to state office, he was a county supervisor like Gore, and Karen worked with them both for years. 

Sen. McGuire was a champion running the live auction part of the program. Part of the action included auctioning off very fancy cakes; we had three of them. The goal is to get some competition going and sell the cake for a ridiculously high amount--say, $1000. The obvious joke is, "Man, that must be some cake!" but in practice it's an excuse for someone who was disposed to donate $1000 anyway to take home a nice cake for their troubles. A firefighter is modeling one of the cakes while Karen stands ready to call out bidders in the background. 

After years of being a weedy dirt field as silent as a tomb, the acre was alive again, with the squealing, boundless energy of children. That hit unexpectedly hard.

After our early afternoon festivities ended, we dashed over to a fire remembrance organized by county Supervisor James Gore, who had also helped inaugurate the park. That was a more sober affair, although Gore also wanted it to be fun and handed out many certificates whose gag titles belied real accomplishments (Karen got one labeling her the "Red Tape Ninja"). It wasn't a large crowd but almost everyone in it had lost something to the fire, and it was good to be together. 

After the park event, the fire remembrance was a chance to highlight and thank people who did critical work in those days. The emergent theme was the importance of community. Karen was one of the speakers, and she's up front next to the red-shirted James Gore. If you haven't picked up on it yet, I think my wife is a real hero and I'm proud to be associated with her. 

Karen and I were both interviewed about our perspectives on the fire nine years later. Mine came down to this: when a disaster like that hits you, your old life is over and your new life begins. For a long time, every day of your new life is horrible. But eventually, you start to accumulate enough happy moments and good memories so that, after nine years, you can look back and honestly say your new life is good. That doesn't mean you stop mourning the loss of your old life or that the disaster was somehow "all for the best" (I hate that platitude), but we're fine and that's pretty great.

If you'd like to help our scrappy little park pay for a gazebo and other beautiful things, here's a QR code that'll make it easy for you! Everything goes right to the park, nobody's making a dime.