Apocalyptic

This was the view yesterday from my house and one from Solano Avenue. The sun is actually blood red - the camera doesn't quite capture it.

These fires are just awful, I am not sure what other words to use.

Just last week I was in Mendocino. Driving up 101 north and west on 128 I was struck firstly, by the beauty of Northern California, especially in this season as the grape leaves in the vineyards are beginning to turn, and shades of russett appear as if a painter had just added them into his painting of the tawny, golden hills. Bucolic and peaceful looking, far from the woes of the world. However, I was also struck by how tinder dry everything appears, despite the fact that we did have rains this winter. I mentioned this to my friends and she told me how difficult it is for them to get fire insurance. At this point I will quickly add that they are, so far, fine.

I have never watched disaster movies, but right now I feel that we are unwilling spectators in an endless movie.

Hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, the volcano threatening to erupt in Bali -the world is really out of balance, and I am not even mentioning HWSNBN.

I am also struck by how people are helping each other, This is one of the encouraging things that happen in disasters and wars. It is lovely to know that humanity can act in this manner. Perhaps we should try to always behave with consideration and compassion, all the time.

God's Little Creatures

I have a confession to make. This is something that is really hard for me to admit, because I am, for the most part, rather a courageous woman, even if I say so myself.

On the surface of things I state and in fact, feel, that I believe in the right to life of all sentient beings, from the tiniest ant, to the largest elephant. I am a defender of sentient beings. I have attended meditation retreats where we vow to spend 10 days in silence, and to not harm any sentient being. How well I remember a retreat in the foggy dampness of a redwood forest in Northern California. We lined up for showers - coldwater showers, in silence. I remember when I stepped in the shower and there on the wall was this most unappealing slug looking thing. It was big, at least 3 " long - magnifying in my mind to at least 3 feet. It had these pine needle looking things sticking out of its head. I was new in America, and new in California. How could I know that this was the state mollusk. A banana slug - something I had never before seen or encountered. It was all I could do to stifle a wild piercing scream.

I shared a bedroom with my sister in South Africa. I seemed to be the only one in our house who stayed up late, lying in bed reading, or studying. Always poring over a book, the light of my bedside lamp to my left, close to my head.

All was quiet, and I savored this time, then the moths would come. I am completely petrified of moths. I remember screamiing in our room one night because there was a zebra moth (black and white stripes) who had flown into our room seeking the light. My father held the moth in his hand, trying to show me how beautiful it was and telling me that it wouldn't, couldn't, do anything to hurt me. All the while I trembled and shrieked and cowered down, hands over my head.

Once when I was living on kibbutz during a period of terror attacks I saw this thing crawl into my home - it was really ugly - I saw horns and fierce eyes, and an artillery shell on its back. I looked at it as it crept even closer and Iyelled. My neighbour came running into my home with his Uzi, prepared to defend me, to defend us. I stood there frozen to a spot pointing at this thing - "Ah Nesta," he said, lowering his Uzi "that is just an artzav." (whatever that is in English I don't know.) Some insect that eats the roots of trees."

I have never attempted to squash or kill these creatures that come in the night, or during the day, or whenever they please - instead I scream and cower and pray, and try to shoo them out.

These fear and horrors have not abated with age. One of the joys of living in Northern California is that it is for the most part, benign.

Today at work, the woman I work for (I am a 'sales associate') called me from outside the back door near the garbage.

"Be careful when you take out the garbage tonight," she said. She pointed to what looked like a stick under a handle of the lid of the garbage. However, the stick was clinging upside down it seemed, with four legs around the handle. We approached it carefully to observe this thing. It really looked like a small broken piece of branch, or wood, except for those legs. It was not moving, and we did not see wings or eyes or anything, but it did cling, unmoving. I picked up a little twig and she took it from me and held it out to the thing and feinted a poke - we both screamed. The stick remained still, sticklike. She poked again. Again we screamed, rather loudly. This occurred in a city, and it was near dusk. We do have neighbours. One would thingk that the screams of two women in a back yard might attract the attention of some neighbours, or anyone passing by. How easily we could have been stabbed or strangled - absolutely noone came to find out what the screams were about.

After she left for the day I took the garbage out to the kerb. This thing remained there throughout the bumpy ride. I photographed it and just then a neighbour did appear, not to save anyone, just to bring out his garbage.

"Look" I said to him.

"A walking stick", he said, calmly and knowingly. "It lives in the trees and eats leaves and insects".