an unobstructed view

a town with no voicemail

When a forest fire threatens your home, there's no time to stage a fight. One minute, you and your family are watching a wisp of smoke curl two miles away. The next minute, a guy in a uniform knocks at your door.

"The fire's turned," he said. "You've got fifteen minutes to pack, and get in your car and leave."

We were veterans of natural disasters. Growing up in Miami, hurricanes visited us nearly every year. The weather man on TV gave you a few days' warning. Your parents put up shutters. School was cancelled. When the breeze started to pick up, you'd grab your skateboard, sneak a pillowcase for a sail, and fly.

Of course, Hurricane Andrew was different. By 1992 we were grown-ups, and this was a grown-up storm. The storm popped roofs and leveled trees. And what Mother Nature didn't destroy, mankind did. Like many others, we moved out of our battered home for a few weeks waiting for electricity and fresh water to be restored. The National Guard circled our neighborhood. A nightly curfew was enforced. Even so, our worse fears came true. To top off what had already been a nightmarish experience, our house was looted and our cars vandalized.

The following year, we decided to spend our summer vacation as far away from the tropics as possible. Jackson Hole was love at first sight. It was everything Miami wasn't. A small community. A place where kids rode their bicycles in the streets and car doors didn't have to be locked. A town with no voice mail. Moose and elk roamed freely over fences designed for them to hurdle. It smelled like evergreen trees and Christmas all year round.

We built a log cabin in the woods, one big enough to accommodate our family and friends. There were horses to ride and streams filled with trout. Though we only owned a small piece of property, the forest was so dense that we felt completely secluded.

We smelled the fire before we saw it. Some overnight hikers ignored a few singed twigs and that was all it took. At first, the fire was an acre. The next day, it was a hundred. In a week, over four thousand acres of land were crackling orange and red. Ashes pelted us like dirty snow. Like hurricanes, major fires are given names. They called this one The Green Knoll.

As soon as the sheriff's deputy left, we spun in circles, prioritizing what was important. My son Jon was fourteen. He unplugged the Nintendo and stuffed it in his duffel. My husband Michael, an attorney, toted the file cabinet that held our papers. My daughter Rachel was eleven. An animal lover, she worried about the wildlife. The owls and squirrels left days before we were told to. She grabbed the dog.

A Red Cross shelter was opened at the local high school for the three hundred people who were homeless. But typical of Jackson Hole, no one needed it. During peak tourist season, hotels lowered their rates. Every evacuee, down to the last horse and cow, had been offered a place to stay.

As the news grew worse and patience wore thin, everyone grew closer. Help arrived from every corner of the country. Volunteers staffed kitchens. Kids donated the money that they had saved for the county fair. Up and down the roads people held handmade signs. Thank you Arizona Wildcats! God Bless you Oregon Smokejumpers!

For five agonizing nights, we parked our car on the highway, sat on the hood, and watched the flames creep down the mountain. One day when the situation looked particularly grim, I called the fire department. The Fire Marshall, Rusty Palmer, returned my call within minutes.

"I know your home. It's been watered and green-slimed. We're taking care of it," he promised. "Call me anytime."

Another day we were having breakfast at a local hangout. If your meal at Bubba's Barbeque didn't come served with bacon, you could rest assured that your food was cooked in it. We were lingering at the table when the Teton County Sheriff joined us. Tall and lanky, Sheriff Bob Zimmer had a handlebar mustache, a cowboy hat, and boots. The kind of guy who's not elected but simply hired by central casting. We'd been going to daily briefings at the high school. He recognized us and sat down.

"How ya-all doin'?" he drawled. "Is there anything I can do to help?"

Eventually the fire crept to within a quarter mile of our home. The ashes on our roof would linger and the haze would take weeks to disappear. But thanks to the incredible efforts of a thousand local and national firefighters, not one structure was lost in the valley. A ring of razed forest would afford us protection for years to come. And our family realized that what we had sought in Wyoming we had found. Community. Friendship. Copious amounts of bacon.

Of course, there would always be naysayers.

"Did you know that a fault line runs along the Tetons?"

We were back in our den. My husband was biting his lip and ripping through page after page of geologic tomes.

"Forty-four miles long," said Michael. "Yellowstone, in fact, is one big boiling cauldron of seismic activity. Yes, siree," said Michael. "This whole place can crack like an egg."

Just to be safe we bought earthquake insurance. I guess you never know.

Marlene Olin's stories have been published in over thirty-five online and print journals. Born in Brooklyn and raised in Miami, she attended the University of Michigan. Marlene presently lives in Coconut Grove, Florida with her husband. She has two children and two grandchildren. She recently compiled a collection of her stories and finished her first novel. Her Twitter handle is @writestuffmiami

For more work by Marlene Olin, check out her page at our Online Sundries site.

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