Flood, Fire, Earthquake, Whatever

More than once in the last couple of days people have asked me if I and my loved ones are okay, all because of the floods that I wasn't aware were happening until they asked me about them. (For the record: we are in no danger of flooding where we are; my parents and one brother all live in a zone that would be under 18 feet of water in a 500-year flood, but this doesn't even come close.) My initial reaction was surprise that something like this would be considered national news.

It's not that I'm callous, and it's not that I don't pay attention to the news. It's just that flooding is pretty much just noise to me by now. I have a Dawn's-in-trouble-must-be-Tuesday reaction. Flooding again? Must be winter.

As Mike Davis points out, in California catastrophic natural processes are the norm...and people from elsewhere in the country have a hard time internalizing that. We have floods every year, mudslides every year, fires every year. Guerneville has a 100-year flood about twice a decade, and Malibu has a catastrophic fire with approximately the same frequency. We don't have catastrophic earthquakes as often, but the earth moves enough often enough to remind us that it will happen.

So I'm okay, my friends and family are okay, and with a very very few unfortunate exceptions Californians in general are okay. Really. We're used to this.

But thanks for asking.

[That's all, folks]