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Woody Woodburn
400 Roosevelt Court
Ventura, CA 93003
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Rose Rises From Thomas Fire’s Ashes
On its homeward voyage, the Apollo 11 capsule – like all spacecraft returning from a lunar visit – crossed an ethereal Rubicon where the moon’s gravitational attraction yielded imperceptibly to the pull of Earth’s gravity.
It seems to me there is a similar invisible line where the gravity of grief and loss is overcome by the pull of healing and happiness. The aftermath of the Thomas Fire, a heinous monster that claimed two lives and more than 700 homes and also turned a million collective photographs into ashes, has reinforced this thought.
For some property victims, this Rubicon of Healing was crossed the moment they safely escaped the fire’s destructive path. For others, it came when they returned to their ruins and uncovered a keepsake piece of jewelry or a treasured heirloom miraculously intact among the cinders.
For many, however, the Rubicon of Healing remains a point far off in the distance of their journey back from the dark side of the moon.
The Thomas Fire razed my childhood home in the wee hours of Dec. 5. Come dawn, however, I honestly felt I had bypassed the gravitational pull of overwhelming loss because all that truly mattered was that my father, who had lived in the house for 44 years, fled harm’s way.
I was, it now seems obvious, in denial. More than being my dad’s house, it was my late mom’s dream home. She died 26 autumns past, come October, and yet the overpowering aura and warmth inside was still of her.
The living room, decorated in her favored blue, was of her. The kitchen, where she rolled out pasta by hand, was of her. The dining room, with her cherished Wedgewood china displayed in a hutch, was of her. Her piano, her books, on and on, her presence in every room.
Every room gone now, burned, cinders and soot.
Because I have the memories, I did not want to see the ashes. Alone among my family, I chose not to go see our home that was no longer there.
I made a similar choice half a century ago. I was two months shy of turning eight and Grandpa Ansel was the only grandparent I had known. I refused to join the procession walking by his open casket because I wanted to remember Grandpa as I had always seen him, alive not dead.
So, too, it was with my childhood home. I stayed away.
But the gravitational pull of loss did not stay away. Finally, the day after Easter, I returned. I drove high into the foothills of Ondulando, turned into a familiar cul-de-sac I no longer recognized, walked up a short driveway leading to where a two-story white house with a front balcony supported by square pillars once stood proudly.
Now, nothing. A moonscape. Even the cement foundation has been removed.
Actually, next to the “nothing” there is something. At the left side of the backyard, near where a hot tub had been, a round fire pit made of red brick remains.
In truth, it ceased being a fire pit a quarter-century back. The first spring following my mom’s death, my dad filled it with potting soil and planted a rose bush. Specifically, a light pink hybrid tea variety named after actress Audrey Hepburn and commonly called simply the “Audrey Rose.”
My mom’s name was Audrey.
In the fire pit-turned-planter on the day following Easter, in a vision filled with symbolism and metaphor, there it was rising from the ashes most literally: our Audrey Rose bush in full bloom.
The gravitational pull of healing took full hold.
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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.
Check out my memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece” and my essay collection “Strawberries in Wintertime: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” …
- Personalized signed copies are available at WoodyWoodburn.com
- Unsigned paperbacks or Kindle ebook can be purchased here at Amazon