The City of Grass Valley, California, is not BURNING!

Judy and I thank those of you who have telephoned us after hearing of the “Grass Valley Fire” on television. We truly appreciate your concern but, as we’ve told you, the fire being reported on television and radio and newspapers is in Southern California, near the resort community of Lake Arrowhead. The Grass Valley being mentioned in those news reports is a small residential neighborhood that carries that name. It is some 600 miles south of the City of Grass Valley, where we live.

Living in a community not dissimilar from that southern Grass Valley and having experienced wildfires close to our home we understand the panic and pain to which our neighbors are being subjected. It is a truly horrible experience. They and we have chosen to live in mountainous-forested areas because of the sheer beauty of the surroundings. When wildfire visits your neighborhood however it takes all you have in material things as well as the natural beauty around you. It’s nothing short of devastating and we grieve for those who have lost so much in the past few days. You can rebuild your home, you can buy new stuff, but you can’t replace the mature forest around you which may have taken hundreds of years to grow.

We’ve been home since the first week of September and have experienced an early Fall. We’ve had rain about once each week and are now ahead of the average season total for this time of the year. Temperatures, until the past several days, have been well below average and our usage of the propane gas in our tank proves it. The furnace has run on most of those days since our return.

I recently read an article written by a forestry professor at some New England University in which he claimed that “global warming” is ruining the Fall colors in New England. He said that there has been a pronounced decrease in the reds and oranges and yellows because of the delay in the onset of cold temperatures in the past few years. If that’s so it’s sad because few places have had a better Fall color display than in New England.

Our early Fall here in Northern California, on the other hand, has colors here in the Sierra Nevada foothills and mountains looking better and brighter than I can remember them being. Even the Black Oaks are getting in the game this year. They have usually had their leaves turn brown on the stem and then fall to the ground. This year, however, as you can see from the photos I’ve included in this posting, they are glorious and brilliant. In the second photo you can see the oaks on the mountainside beyond the valley behind our home.

The view looking east from our back deck