There is Fire in My Heart

Being outside during the pandemic has saved my family. In our backyard, my daughter Ella can play on her tree swing, my partner Andy can work in his shed, and I can do my gardening. That is harmonious living. Going river rafting and camping have been even more nourishing because we could enjoy nature and social distance safely with friends.

A week ago, we took our last trip to the Deschutes River to take advantage of the weather, before the rains would descend upon Portland, and we'd be forced back inside. We had monitored the location and severity of the fires around Oregon before we left for our trip. But, we didn't think the fires would affect us as we were miles away from the epicenters. We packed up our raft and our camping gear and headed east to the river where we met up with our friends.

The first day on the Deschutes River was magical. With Andy as our oarsman, we floated down ten miles in our raft and made camp along the river below a picturesque hillside, near a good fishing run. Ella put on her bathing suit while I blew up her enormous pink sprinkled donut float. We lazed by the river and watched our friend catch and release a native 15-pound steelhead. We ate a delicious meal of seared Ahi Tuna and pea salad, then went to bed under a blanket of sparkling stars.

The next morning, smoke started to creep into the valley, hanging like a low cloud along the rim of the hillside. Andy had hoped that the winds would shift, and the smoke would blow away. But throughout the day, we watched a thick blanket of smoke fill up the valley, obscuring the train tracks on the hill. By nightfall, my eyes were burning, my throat sore. As the air quality had not improved by morning, we decided that it was time for us to head home. We took our time breaking down our camp and packing up the boats, disappointed that our carefree weekend was over.

We floated down the remaining fourteen miles to the Deschutes River's mouth, where it met the Columbia River, the air thickening at each passing mile. Finally able to get cell service, I looked up the air quality in the Dalles, the closest Oregon city to where we were - and the number read 442 - Hazardous. While the warning bells went off in my head, it wasn't until I started driving back to Portland that I realized the seriousness of the situation. The air was so thick with smoke that I could see only the rear of the car before me, and nothing else. Driving was like flying a plane through a storm cloud without radar. As Andy and Ella slept in the truck, I thought about the devastation being caused by this fire. My heart began to crackle with a maelstrom of emotions - fear, anxiety, and grief. My eyes welled up with tears.

When we got home, I made Ella her dinner and then helped Andy quickly unload the car, worried now of the lingering effects of having spent two days outside under hazardous conditions. Later that night, Ella sensed the worry in my voice when I told her about the fires nearby. She started to cry because she thought that she’d have to leave her stuffed animals behind if we had to evacuate. I assured her that her American Girl Dolls, giant panda stuffy, and elephant could come with us. When she was safely in bed, I turned on the news to find out that the Riverside Fire, the one closest to Portland, was only 30 miles away and zero percent contained. Some communities in neighboring Clackamas county had already been evacuated. The fire was closer than I thought.

The kindling that had been sparked in my heart a few hours before now ignited a small fire. Fires are unpredictable and wild; they can wipe out an entire community in a matter of moments. Our house and our community were being threatened. I felt such profound sadness about the loss that was around us. Oregonians were losing their homes and their businesses. We were losing the forests that have become our second backyards. The small town where my family and I had vacationed a few years ago on the McKenzie River had been burned to the ground. The fire was at our backdoor steps. I went to bed filled with sadness and anxiety.

The next morning, I searched on the Internet for updates on the fire. On Facebook, my friends from Portland posted pictures of the air quality and helpful articles on keeping safe during a forest fire. Scrolling back a few days, I saw posts from my New York friends about the 19th anniversary of 9/11. Since we were out of town for several days before 9/11, I hadn't thought about that grave day as I usually did.

Over the next few days, the memories came back to me in drips. Thinking back to that drive back to Portland and that feeling of overwhelming sadness, it started to dawn at me - the smoke had triggered my memories of 9/11. The fires raging around Oregon were forcing me to confront painful memories of one of the most horrific events in American history.

On September 11th, 2001, I was at a week-long corporate training held at a New Jersey hotel. In the middle of a lesson, a hotel employee entered the room to tell our instructor the news - an airplane had flown into one of the Twin Towers. We filed out of the banquet room and into the hall, where multiple televisions were broadcasting news of the event. From the large bank of windows on the other side of the hallway, we could see the wounded silver Twin Tower across the flat New Jersey landscape. Then, in horror, we watched on the news as a second airplane hit the second tower. Moments later, one tower, then the other, came tumbling to the ground. My heart pounded and my body weakened as I watched what was happening to my beloved city. My colleagues and I stood in front of those floor to ceiling windows overlooking the surreal landscape before us. In the empty space at the tip of Manhattan where the towers once stood, black smoke billowed into the air.

The conference was canceled, and we were told to stay the night, or longer if we needed to. My friends and I sat in the hotel bar, numb to what had just happened. I knew that I needed to go back home to my apartment in the West Village, where I lived with my sister. Cell phone circuits had been busy all day, so I couldn’t get in contact with her. Since all the bridges were closed, there was no way I could go home to make sure she was safe.

I checked out of the hotel the next day and drove back to my office in northern New Jersey. During my drive, I heard an announcement on the radio that the George Washington Bridge had just opened. I made a detour and crossed the bridge into Manhattan. When I entered the city, it was barely recognizable. The sidewalks were empty of pedestrians, the streets empty of cars. The only vehicle I saw on the road was an armored tanker. While heading south towards the West Village, a police barricade stopped me at 14th Street. Traffic was being diverted to limit activity in the downtown area. I parked my car in Chelsea, made it past the barricade, and was safely home with my sister on Bank Street. I looked out my 5th-floor bedroom windows where I once had a view of the tops of the Twin Towers, two tall sentries watching over Lower Manhattan. Through my window frame, all I could see in its place was smoke.

My sister and I walked around our neighborhood to assess the situation. The smoke obscured what was supposed to be a beautiful September day. The air smelled of metal, and I could feel tiny metal particles in my throat as I inhaled. 'Missing Persons' flyers had started to go up on the empty walls of buildings and the fences surrounding small city parks. People lined up at Saint Vincent's Hospital to give blood. At some point, my sister and I learned that New Yorkers had transformed Chelsea Piers into a makeshift volunteer headquarter. We knew that we needed to go there to help.

At Chelsea Piers, we were met with a volunteer coordinator. My sister, who was studying to be a clinical psychologist, volunteered to be on call to help anyone in need of counseling. Since I had a car, I volunteered to drive people. My first assignment was to pick up Long Island nurses who had just arrived to help out with medical care and transport them to Ground Zero. When I pulled up to the front of Penn Station, I saw three women on the sidewalk waiting. I don't remember much about them, or how I knew they were volunteer nurses. I only remember that they wore clean, tidy clothes and optimistic faces. I rolled down my window and asked if they were waiting for a ride to Ground Zero. When they nodded their heads, I unlocked the door and waved them into the car.

As we drove south towards Ground Zero, the scenery looked like the backdrop to a dystopian apocalyptic film, an ominous cloud of dark gray smoke hovering overhead. As we got closer, the stacks of black smoke escaping from the epicenter of the disaster grew more visible. I passed several police barricades before I was told that I could not go any further. I dropped the nurses off along the West Side Highway and wished them well. I set out to return to Chelsea Piers, but someone knocked on my window before I could turn northbound. He asked if I'd be willing to take three firefighters back to Queens. Of course, I said, unlocking my doors. Three firefighters covered in soot, their faces filled with exhaustion, climbed into my car.

As I drove up the West Side Highway towards the Triboro Bridge, the air grew clearer. I looked over at the fireman in my passenger seat, his uniform covered with black markings and his helmet resting on his lap. I saw the devastation in his face. The two men in the back seat gazed out the windows, lost in their thoughts. I wanted to ask them: What did you see at Ground Zero? What did you witness in the wreckage? Did you find any survivors? I yearned to tell them how brave they were to dedicate their lives to serving others, to tell them how much I appreciated them. But I said nothing. I sat with them in silence, in the gravity of the situation, in heartbreak and pain.

Those two rides that I gave to first responders after 9/11 were my last. By the time I returned to Chelsea Piers, the city had gotten more organized, and civilians were no longer needed to transport first responders. In the days that followed, instead of going back to Chelsea Piers, my sister and I went to the West Side Highway and cheered on the first responders. We held out signs of encouragement as ambulances and fire engines went north or south on the highway. We were all hoping to hear the sound of sirens and the sight of a white truck with flashing red lights. But no such ambulance came from Ground Zero. There were no survivors.

The smoke that has covered Portland for the last few days has improved considerably. It is no longer hazardous, though the air quality still fluctuates. Though our forests are still burning, firefighters have made great progress in containing the wildfires. Over the last week, the fire in my heart has also been tamped down. I don’t recall telling anyone about those days following 9/11, not even my sister. I called her up the other day to tell her how I was feeling. Just speaking to someone about those memories helped me navigate those intense emotions. Writing this piece has also helped me process these painful memories. Crying - that too has helped.

We all have lived through our own traumas. Some are personal traumas, while others are collective. Some have happened during childhood, others in adolescence and adulthood. Some memories of past traumas can sneak up on us when we least expect it, some roll in like a slow-rolling fog. In my mindfulness practice, I know that the only way to heal from traumatic events is to truly experience those emotions, however uncomfortable they are. So, instead of pushing the feelings that come up, I allow the fire of emotions to run wild until they subside. I’m not sure if we can ever fully heal from traumas. But I do know that we can find peace with them. They become part of our story, no longer buried under protective armor or hidden in plain sight, no longer the driver of our life’s narrative.

One thing I know comes from healing. Eventually, those fires, that reckoning with emotions, turn into embers, and our hearts fill with the only thing left within - Love. With personal trauma, that love is a deep love for self. For being a survivor, for persevering despite the circumstances, for being courageous in the face of adversity. With collective trauma, that love is a deep love for others and a desire for connection and belonging.

My experiences during 9/11 and the Oregon wildfires have sparked that yearning for connection and deepened my love for others. Love for my newly adopted city of Portland and my beloved hometown of New York City. Love for our first responders. Love for my family and friends. Love for my neighbors and community. Love for my country. Love for humanity. Love for our earth.

Yes, I can feel it. There is love in my heart.