In the face of the fires that devastated a good part of Los Angeles, the effects are seen everywhere, no one escapes. Some lost their homes. The rich, the workers. Others lost their stories, built for so long, through sweat, long days of sacrifice.
Tragedies do not measure the rich or the poor, they hit everyone, in different ways. Nothing is more descriptive than the GoFundMe stories. The stories told by those affected are heartbreaking, they unite us with the tragedy and show the solution to these problems: the only solution at this time is solidarity, it is sharing with each other the little or much that one has.
There are the day laborers, who donate their time and work to restore public spaces to a normality that will never exist again. Also the friends, the family and the activists and politicians who are sensitive to the tragedy.
“This is the story of a user identified as ‘jennarose nicholas’:
This home wasn’t just a house—it was where we brought our baby home for the first time, where we looked forward to celebrating life’s milestones, sending our boy to school and where countless memories could have been now buried in ash. Now, we face the uncertainty of losing it all.”
Or Nancy De La Torre’s.
“My dear neighbor, friend, and family home was tragically destroyed in the Eaton Canyon fires. This house has been like a second home to me since I was 1, and now everything is gone.
They are facing an incredibly difficult and heartbreaking time and desperately need our support.”
And that of John Chavez:
“Hi Friends…. we are the Qamar Chavez family, and we lost our home and community in the Eaton Canyon Fire currently raging through Altadena and Northeast LA County. We are evacuated and safe, and anxiously watching the news and hoping for the best for everyone currently dealing with similar situations across the city. We are collecting funds to help with immediate expenses while we sort through the insurance process and rebuild our home. We love our community and are going to come back stronger than ever.”
Or the desperate story of Alana Bowman:
“As many of you have heard, a quick moving fire swept through parts of Clearlake earlier today. With no time to prepare, Alana, her boyfriend and daughter escaped with just some of their pets and the clothes on their backs. This could not have happened at a worse time as she just lost her mother, our dear friend Maryellen, just three weeks ago. We were all literally gathering at their home just 24 hours before for Maryellen’s birthday/celebration of life. Not only are they still working through their new life without Maryellen, but now they have lost their home and everything they owned. In the coming weeks they will need any help that they can get. Please donate if you can and please share.
These are times to rebuild and grow as a community. The urgency of finding culprits is sad and meaningless, as if pointing fingers could bring relief to the thousands of affected people.
Los Angeles is multicultural, progressive, and resilient. Every day, all of this will be put to the test.
Protecting Your (and Your Kids’) Mental Health After a Natural Disaster
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