Published by Loam
Words by Nicole Stanton
Illustration by Delaney Gibbons
One of the first stories we shared on The Mortar was a brilliantly strange portrait of Los Angeles, published in the wake of last year’s wildfires. Today’s selection returns to the same subject, but with very different results, as writer Nicole Stanton reflects on her own response to the fires, and the ideas of safety and community that hold us together.
Leaving
The day the Santa Ana winds picked up, two or three students lingered in the English office to meet with teachers, but none of them were the one I was waiting for. Outside, hurricane-like winds shredded fronds from the trunks of palms and sent them plummeting groundwards. Oak leaves blew in gusts and swirls. I thought of my dog at home and let I’ll be home soon tumble from my mouth in a whisper, as though she might hear me two freeways away.
My dog and I once risked a walk in winds like this, and a palm frond landed in front of us on the sidewalk. Now, at the smallest gust of wind, her tail tucks between her legs like a comma. I like that she won’t ever invent a new fear, without something real attached. But once she does get scared, she absorbs her fear as a truth by which to live her days. I try to learn from her — I am afraid of so many things that will never come close to me.