Dear FlyLady,

Intuition & routines saved our lives during the Cascade Fire. I live….or rather have lived…..in Northern California. I’ve been a FlyBaby on & off for YEARS. We had just gotten back on the routines bandwagon recently & had been making beautiful progress. (Sorry, this is a bit on the long side….but so much to share)

The other night we had 50 mph or more wind gusts & the power was cycling on & off a few times before it cut out for good. There was a niggling in the back of my mind. I started mentally tabulating, OK, here’s where Husband’s clothes are….here’s where my clothes are…..here’s where all 3 of the furbabies food is. I pulled the cat carrier down from it’s storage location (because I had been decluttering & had a place for it). I kept checking out all of the windows and walking out on the deck to really LOOK around. My husband couldn’t understand why I was pacing the house like a caged lion. He settled down on the couch with the dogs to wait until the power was restored, meanwhile I paced mentally running checklists & getting a few things piled onto our bed. Then we smelled campfire……CLOSE campfire. We went out & looked…..still black sky (this was happening at 10:45, 11:00 at night). I pull out the jugs of water because we have a well….no power….no water. The campfire smell is CLOSER. We go on the deck & look…..the house closest to the main road looks like there is a bonfire…..they don’t have fires in THAT spot….we turn to look BEHIND us & the sky is a sea of red….even the moon is red. We run into the house, gather the furbabies, put their food into the car, throw some clothes into the car, pack some essential electronic items. I have the presence of mind to go to our bedroom & get handkerchiefs to wet & tie over our faces to cut the smoke (because we’d been putting things in their places as we went along & because I had pulled the water jugs out already.) We gather our elderly aunt who shares our property & put her in her own car with her pets, & we leave the house. A tree traps us in the driveway, but because of gentle FlyWashing, my husband knows exactly where his chainsaw is & it has everything on it ready to go. We cut our way out ensuring that we & our elderly aunt was able to escape the flames & get to safety.

We hadn’t quite made it to a point in our FlyWashing that we had a central location for important papers & such…..but of the family members that live on a combined 10 acres, my husband & I were the only ones that had been able to pack clothes & other important items. The fire gave us no warning…..but my intuition (plus some FlyWashing) saved us, our precious furbabies, & managed to give us a change of clothes when we lost EVERYTHING else.

So, thank YOU for being here for me to learn from……& I’m so glad that both my husband & I didn’t brush my feelings aside & we actually heeded my warnings.

Sincerely,

Singed but safe in Northern California.

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