This was the Summer Turned Inside Out. Blogging and a lot of other things (fishing trips, home improvements, were suspended at the end of June.

In the early morning of June 29th, a tree fell against a power line in a little 1950s-vintage mountain subdivision perhaps thirty minutes’ drive away. Local firefighters responded, but the west winds blew and the pines were thick. They called for help from nearby departments (but not mine, for jurisdictional reasons). It got worse.

The fire had the little town of Beulah in its sights. Known as the Aspen Acres Fire, it burned more than 102,000 acres (43,000 ha), destroying almost two hundred homes and many other structures, including an iconic park lodge.

But then it thought, if fires think,¹ “What about those people over there? I don’t stop at county lines.” On the morning of July 2nd, we were put on “pre-evac,” which to me meant go ahead and air up the tires of the camping trailer while hoping that we did not have to go anywhere. But by late afternoon the word came down: “Go.”

We ended up on friends’ horse property outside Pueblo: they were super-helpful, Marco the dog could hang with their big dogs — but it was not home, and I had an hour’s drive to the firehouse, on the days I worked.

But I had forgotten about the outdoor shrine! I was used to one- or two-night evacuations, not two weeks,

There it was, back in the trees, with its small roofed box holding god and goddess statues, the little altar, some other objects . . . It used to be screened by junipers and scrub oaks — not any more! A bulldozer had gone within a few feet of one sculpture at the “gate,” and the sawyers’ chainsaws opened up the view.

I wonder if anyone realized what they were looking at. Meanwhile, I scooped up the images and moved to the house, because the “army” would be back.

After the fire was contained, they had to mitigate (sort of) the environmental damage they had done. All the trees and brush cut to slow the fire’s spread were piled in “slash piles.” Those had to be chipped. I cajoled a couple of supervisors into doing the chipping on site rather than hauling the branches to the central chipping spot, I wanted the chips for mulch. And I high-graded all the big pieces for firewood before the chipping crew showed up.

And they need at a minimum to dig water bars (angled trenches built up on the downhill side) in the dozer bars to divert rainwater to one side or the other that it would not turn the dozer scar into a gully.

Revegetation? That was up to me (and Nature). So off I went buying “reclamation mix” grass seed at $10–$14 per pound. I’m ready now, just waiting for first frost.

But the shrine? Maybe there’s a lesson there. Maybe it had been too concealed. You can’t see it from the road. I think about rebuilding it more with stone — I have lots of sizeable stones lying around, ripped up by dozer and track hoe. I can’t bring back the screen of trees, obviously. But there will continue to be something,