On Friday, the 29th of July, 2022, a wildfire broke out near highway 96, northwest of Yreka. On Saturday the 30th as well as Sunday, I worked the night shift at the Rescue Ranch to keep the lights on in the event anyone needed to come in and drop off dogs that were evacuated from the fire area. I didn't wait very long to evacuate the motorhome from the RV park and relocate it out to the Rescue Ranch because I wanted to be in a position where I wasn't worried about Remi or the motorhome and could just focus on helping out at Rescue Ranch. The night shift pretty much meant that I started covering the desk and phone at 8:00 PM and work until around 6:00 AM. I remember working the night shift when I worked for Safeway, but I forgot how much, at least on short spirts, that I'm just not wired for it, or at least the quick alteration from an 8 AM to 5 PM job to one that is 12 hours shifted from that, but I lived through it.
Fortunately, both evenings were pretty quiet, and really the only things I worked on was getting us caught up on laundry and dishes. Most of the time, I was just struggling to keep myself awake. During the first couple of days, the Rescue Ranch had over 140 dogs come in, including one mamma and her puppies as well as another pour little guy who was in desperate need of a bath. And just like with the Lava Fire, the community responded great with donations including a lot of dog food. Rescue Ranch was running out of space, so for the first time since the Grey jeep was bought, I put the trailer hitch into use and pulled a county trailer over to the ranch so that additional emergency kennels could be set up. It does come in handy being a known entity by both organizations so that I can work more seamlessly between the two.
The manager of the Siskiyou County Animal shelter, a lady named Stephanie was supposed to go on vacation for a week, leaving the Saturday that the fire broke out. She cancelled her vacation because she knew her duty was here as a fire was raging in the community. She really needed to be at the county's Emergency Operations Center coordinating the Animal Care concerns during the disaster. I had planned for some time to go over to the shelter on Monday the 1st of August to help out at the County Shelter, but with the outbreak of the fire, I offered to Stephanie to do what I could to take care of the animal care during at least the next week if that was at all possible. I got clearance from my boss to do this and proceeded to staff the county shelter animal welfare aspect of things until the following Sunday. I consider myself very fortunate that the county has been willing to show the trust in me to allow me to care for the animals during the disaster. It is really very humbling, but I do get to work with some amazing animals.
The bad news from the McKinney fire as it was called, is that it expanded very quickly, and though at the time it seemed like it took forever, in reality, in a few days, the incident went into Unified Command and CAL FIRE came in to help the US Forest Service to get the blaze under control. Fortunately, within about 10 days, it appeared that things would start to return to normal soon. However, during that 10 days, a lot of resources entered the area and were brought to bare in the region to help fight the McKinney fire as well as the China 2 fire and several others, most of which started from lightning strikes in the area.
Before we knew it, within about 14 days, we were starting to demobilize from the incident and life was starting to return back to a form of normalcy.
As I alluded to in one of my earlier posts, I'm finding myself in a spot of fulfillment in my life right now living in Yreka. I wouldn't say that Yreka, in and of itself is fulfilling, but I have started to build some relationships and trusts, that are very fulfilling. I really like volunteering at Rescue Ranch and I so firmly believe in their mission, but admittedly, with all the dogs that are there, is a little overwhelming. Also, some of the personality dynamics of the humans remind me of living with my parents who fought all the time, and I just really am over all that sort of drama.
The county shelter really speaks to me, I truly enjoy volunteering there and the lady Stephanie who is the Shelter manager and I seem to get along well. At the time that the fire was really raging, we were down to only 8 dogs and 2 cats in our care. It takes 4 plus hours to Feed, socialize, clean, walk and medically care for all of them. Plus I would go back in the evening for around 2 hours to do another medical treatment and socialization of our cats. It's a drag doing it alone during the fire, but it is intimate, and I am really getting to know all of the animals being cared for at the county shelter. It is that intimate feeling that really appeals to me. At Rescue Ranch, through no fault of their own, it feels so hard to get to know all of the dogs. Some of them I know, but some of them have been there for multiple years, and it breaks my heart.
At the county shelter, though the environment for the dogs may not be quite as airy and enjoyable for the dogs as it is at Rescue Ranch, I do feel connected to all of them because I get to work with all of them. I wish I could put it in better terms than that, but there you go. Also, Stephanie, the shelter manager is simply amazing. Very organized, eager to learn, willing to teach and has the capacity to work with just about any sort of personality while always holding true to her "true north".
I worry about some of the staff at Rescue Ranch. I sometimes fear some of them are running on auto pilot and not being able to get to know the beings who they are caring for. It almost feels like there are those that are just doing the job to do it. I do truly believe that they believe in the mission of Rescue Ranch, but the population of the ranch is so large right now, especially with the evacuee dogs, that I just don't know that they can keep going. I also worry about the organization financially. I don't know how they are keeping things going the way they are. But, I'm not on the board, maybe they are financially well-afloat and there are no financial concerns. I wish they could have kept the boarding operation going. A lot of people in the community have complained that they are no longer available as a resource, and it might have been a source of income, but who knows. But even if money is not an issue, I still worry about the emotional health of the organization. The one good thing I have noticed is they have a lot more volunteers recently since the fires this summer.
I have to be careful though about letting the authentic me out too much. I have started to see glympses of who I am in that caring and compassionate person that I guess I have always been deep down inside. I like being that person who says "Yes, I'll commit to that... " when no one else will. I'm not trying to be better than anyone else, but I just want to help, and I very much am. I get a lot of satisfaction and even a bit of "Reason for Being" out of doing what I do. As I get older, I truly appreciate how the elderly can feel discarded. Some of it can be by being less active, but some of it could be by others thinking those of us over 60, can't do certain things anymore.
I think that caring aspect of me, at least in the past, has had the side effect of chasing people away, or at least keeping them at a distance. It's so frustratingly awkward, wanting to be a caring helpful friend but then reflecting on how that person I use to be 30 years ago, would lose friends because of trying to help too much. It's frustrating because there are times I want to reach out and say "Hey, how can I help" but I only do it 25 percent of the times that I think I want to do that. I've lost some great dear friends in the past because I think they feel I'm getting "Weird" on them. I want to treat others the way I would like to be treated. Though I don't need anything at this point in my life, I'd like people to be willing to check in on me and say "Hey Eric, how are you doing???". Conversely, I want to do the same with them, but then again, I don't want to weird anyone out, nor to I want to be nosey. Ughhh.
I've never been a jock, never really wanted to be. Honestly, I am a nerd, have been pretty much from the beginning. Though, I've never tried to let that get in my way of doing physical stuff if I can. We were putting folded animal crates away (that probably weigh about 20 pounds) into stack in a storage container the other day. I was totally bummed that I ran out of gas stacking those crates and I had to rotate out and let someone else take care of storing the rest. I guess I need to stick with cleaning kennels and buying pizza's for the rest of the workers. LOL
But seriously, even though I've always been a bit of weakling, and the fact that I am 60, I do try to get out there and still swing and contribute. Don't get me wrong, I know I make a difference. I also am fully aware that I'm willing to do stuff a lot of people are not willing too, but I do wonder if I would have been better served sometimes if I had been more into being into physical fitness and worrying about my physique. But then again, it might have changed my desires in other areas, away from compassion and other socially important things, so who knows. I am who I am and I'm glad that I have the heart that I do.
Here is the video from this some of the McKinney fire.
Safe Travels all!
Remi and Eric too
