The Santa Ana winds came to Southern California with a vengeance on Saturday night. It started out as a hot, gorgeous day, perfect for the UCLA - Cal game at the Rose Bowl. Then, as fast as a click of a mouse, the winds made their brutal presence known, causing chaos everywhere. Think hurricane with heat instead of the rain and cold. Santa Monica looked like the mother lode of palm trees had exploded, with sharp, jagged palm fronds everywhere. I guess that is our equivalent of Autumn leaves, only they are at least 6 feet long, and it takes a lot more than a rake to dispose of them.
The Santa Ana's, affectionately know as the Devil Winds, arrive every fall, blowing in from the desert, ready to zap the moisture out of every living thing in their path from foliage to the lining of your nose. Every time they arrive, I think of the book and movie "The White Oleander" whose central plot revolved around the Santa Ana winds. I can still see Michelle Pfeiffer and Alison Lohman sitting on a rooftop overlooking Los Angeles, while the invisible but powerful winds were dancing all around. If it weren't for the all the fires they help trigger and promote, you could almost find them enchanting and seductive. There is nothing like warm, forceful air, consuming your body and proving just how ominous Mother Nature really is. Of course for people like me with allergies, it is grit, dust, pollens, mole spores, and irritants consuming my sinuses.
The fires started before 6 a.m. Sunday morning in Malibu and have not let up yet. On Sunday night, looking down the coast of Santa Monica towards neighboring Malibu, all I could see along Pacific Coast Highway was a line of vehicles with flashing red lights. All you could hear was the back ground music of sirens filling the air. Although it was a beautiful sunset, with the pink cloudy glow surrounding the sun, you couldn't ignore the smell of smoke in the air and the brown haze that is everywhere.
I have lived in Southern California for many years and this is the most frightening fire season I have ever experienced. There are at least 13 major fires going simultaneously, including Malibu, Lake Arrowhead, Orange County and San Diego. They have evacuated 250,000 people from San Diego alone. Folks, this is a real disaster area.