You (the generic you – not me in particular – I can’t avoid them but I make a point to not look at too many – we can’t turn away, but we also have to know our own boundaries for what and how much to let in) could spend hours, if not days, looking through all the photographs and videos of during and aftermath, and the before and after pictures – the magnitude is overwhelming, almost numbing – they convey some sense of it, but will never be the reality. Somehow this comic distilled it all in a way the pictures can’t.
So many stories. Here was one I don’t think we hear too often – the story behind the stories – about the journalists at the local paper, The Press Democrat, as they covered the news. And, Memorial Hospital, which is a few blocks from where I live.
Although I’ve lived in Sonoma County since 1992, and Santa Rosa since 2008, I did not know there was a similar fire in 1964. Well, similar in where it burned – with the burn areas more sparsely populated at that time the impact on homes was much less.
Also, two women who evacuated on bikes to get around gridlocked traffic. One pregnant, with kids in a trailer! The other, with a 70-pound dog in a duffel bag!
Speaking of bikes, a GoFundMe has been set up to buy bikes for kids who lost theirs during the fire.
Other fundraisers: Letterpress print from Folding Bones Press, Rose Resilience pin by Mikayla Butchart (oops, looks like it’s sold out – still, very cool design, and who knows, there may be another order), AllTheBeers – started with Russian River Brewing, looks like there’s a shit ton more now. Also at Flagship Taproom in Cotati you can buy a first responder a beer! Direct assistance to firefighters who have lost their homes.
2m2t 