Life Is Sometimes Beyond Our Control

I know this isn't a news blog, but I wanted to talk about the fires in California a bit. For the past couple days, every time you turn on the TV or hop online, similar headlines dominate every news source: He Sends Help to California: Wildfires Force 1 Million to Flee (AOL/AP), 500,000 Forced to Flee Fires (Yahoo!/AP), California Fires Continue Raging Out of Control (Google/New York Times) , Smoke, Wind, Destruction (Drudge Report Main Page/knbc.com).

This is just absolutely horrific. It's kind of similar to Katrina in a way -a natural disaster destroying a part of America and killing innocent people.I had the opportunity to study and work in Los Angeles last semester and while I was there, I had the chance to take a trip to the San Diego area where the fires are currently blazing. It's an absolutely beautiful part of the country -palm trees galore, perfect green grass complimented with perfect, clear, blue skies - the kind you see in your happiest dreams, or at least in plavix commercials with the elated old timers dancing in their yards (minus the palm trees). I can't even imagine what it must look like covered in ashes.

This event really shook me because a family I know (friends of a friend) were recently forced to evacuate their San Diego home. They stuffed their car with belongings until they could fit no more and left. In a moment of pure innocense, their five year-old son asked if they had brought any peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. It's moments like these that prove that we really don't need much in order to survive. It's moments like these that show us what's really important in life and it's moments like these that make us realize the overwhelming importance of people over things.

What do you do in a situation like this? Where do you go? Do you start over somewhere completely new? Do you try to re-build knowing it will never be the same with vacant lots and missing people constantly reminding you of the devastation you once faced? Life is sometimes beyond our control.