The Fires

It feels like we are beginning to pull out of the worst and scariest part of these wildfires. I'm grateful that I live in a town about 20 miles from the nearest fire zone. We opened evacuation shelters here but did not have to evacuate any neighborhoods ourselves. The first (and worst) night, I woke up and smelled smoke. But I thought the neighbor was smoking nextdoor and didn't realize it was from the fire until the next morning.

The people in the this area are really kind and neighborly and the shelters were quickly overflowing with volunteers and donations pretty early on, I decided that my role would be to support our students, many of whom live in towns to the north most hard hit by fires. I spent a lot of time messaging and calling students on my caseload to make sure they were okay. Three or four of our students did lose their homes and many were evacuated and went to stay with family or in shelters. A couple went to wait it out  in hotels in San Francisco.

I was actually glad to connect with students when I started doing outreach because I was needing some human connection and just to talk with people about what was going on. It was also good to feel useful.  On Monday a few colleagues and I got together and created a tentative plan for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday of this week, then went out to lunch and just processed with ourselves. When we open tomorrow and we're going to have some food for the students and time to talk with one another and participate in a healing circle. Our Director is going to talk about what to expect in terms of feelings and experiences and when someone should get help. We're also going to do some meditation and mindfulness. So definitely a soft start.

I can't believe over 40 people died. I felt horrible when I heard two people had been found, then the number kept rising all week. Apparently the fire just moved so fast because of the wind that some people didn't have time to get out. A lot of these folks who died were older, in their 70s, 80s, and 90s. On Monday, my Director pointed out that many neighborhoods in this beautiful area have a lot of retirees. I was initially thinking it was only because of mobility and communication issues. I do still think that's sadly a piece of the puzzle, though. It's such a loss. Secondary losses include hundreds of thousands of acres of wildlands, several thousand homes and structures, and several wineries and vineyards, which are key to the local economy.

So glad historic downtown Sonoma didn't end up burning. The Firefighters are huge heroes who held the line there and many other places, preventing additional loss. Praying for families who lost loved ones or homes and for the ongoing recovery process.

I survived this long a** bus trip, and all I got was a drunken harmonica serenade.

Well, I survived two days of bus commuting to work.  The first day was chaotic trying to figure everything out (I took two buses and one rapid transit train to get there), but the timing went as well as it could have at about an hour and 15 minutes to an hour and a half each way (It normally takes me 30-40 minutes in the car).   My "rookie bus rider" credentials, however, were definitely on fine display!  Running here, running there, trying to put my transfer in the dollar bill slot, hitting the side of the bus when it's just driving up five feet to the correct boarding area, etc.  Super cool.

The second day was okay getting there (though I did get on one wrong bus and had to get off, cross the street, and switch) but coming back, what a nightmare!  I think one of the buses didn't come for some reason so there were tons of people waiting at every stop and pretty soon the bus was crammed with people: professional commuters, teens, moms and little kids, elderly folks, drunk possibly homeless men playing the harmonica and singing, "Leave me alooone, why dontcha leave me alooone!" over and over.   Yes, the latter was in fact experienced by me and all the other lucky folks on Bus 57 in Oakland at 5 p.m.  Good stuff! ha!  That "special" commute took me almost two hours! 

I definitely learned a lot.  Bus drivers put up with tons of crap, and they really keep this city running.  A lot of people depend on them to get around, and they mean business in getting where they need to go.  I'm glad to know that I CAN commute to work on public transportation, even if I'd be fine if I never had to do it again.  And boy did it make me appreciate my car and realize how very much I, and most people, rely on cars to get around. 

After that marathon commute, I walked on over to the local auto mechanic to check on my car, which was ready.  The body work isn't done but, in addition to replacing the crushed-in radiator, he stretched out the hood, got new hinges (the whole hood had been shoved back, ruining the old hinges), and got the hood to passably close.  It still has little cracks on the sides but at least it's on there well and latched.  AND, he accepted partial payment, the rest to be paid in two weeks!  Can you believe it?  He's a total neighborhood mechanic, with good local relationships and a very neighborly attitude.  I will not forget this and will totally refer people to him.  What a great guy.

No ttc for me this coming cycle, though.  I'll be waiting until after my appointment on the 15th, then going on from there.  I have no idea when my period is going to start this month.  Ovulation is hard to predict just looking at my bbt chart.  I don't think Fertility Friend is right in saying I ovulated on Cycle Day 22, though.  My bet is on Day 18, which makes this 10 dpo versus 6 dpo.  I had that weird slow temp rise, like the egg was taking it's time releasing or got stuck.  My body had such a huge surge of HCG last month, I can see why it would be confused.  My temps are nice and high now though.

I started taking Myo-inositol and Melatonin, along with the DHEA, COQ10, Vitamin D and Prenatal.  I looked it up and it's part of the famed Denver CCRM recommended protocol, so it has to have some merit, right?  I don't think it will hurt, and maybe it will help.  You know, a lot of these supplements actually have anti-cancer and heart healthy benefits, which it kind of interesting to me.  The more conscious "fertility" (i.e. healthy) diet plus health supplements add up to me living more healthy than I would otherwise.  Maybe I'm just trying to find the silver lining in trying all these years and not succeeding. 

I'm very sad about two blogger friends' pregnancies ending.  I was optimistic about both of them, and it's a shock and just so unfair.  I'm thinking of them a lot.