Photo Essay: Two Weeks Later

This is a public piano located along the waterfront in Kelowna. In the early afternoon on the Saturday of the last long weekend of the summer, no one was playing it.

Two weeks ago today, Geo and I were out of our home, on evacuation order because of the Kelowna fires. The next day, we were allowed back after only three nights. We were so very fortunate. Our home and neighbourhood are unscathed. But many in our region have returned to damaged homes. And many are still not allowed home. And far too many have no home to return to. Neighbourhoods are scarred. So much has changed.

I stood on the waterfront yesterday morning looking across the lake, studying the swath of black scars through the hills and neighbourhoods across the water. It’s so vast, impossible to capture in one photo.

I wasn’t alone. A few others stood nearby, also looking. It was eerily quiet. In the summer, especially on the last long weekend of tourist season, it is rarely quiet in downtown Kelowna. Another woman stood near me.

“It looks so different now,” she said.

Yes, I replied. We made eye contact and nodded at each other, two strangers connected by community.

“Thank goodness for the firefighters,” she said. We nodded at each other again.

Her words made me want to cry. Yes, thank goodness for the firefighters who came from near and far. They saved so many homes. Even as their own homes were burning or in danger, they fought for all of us.

No, that’s not fire. I took the above photo a few mornings ago. It was early. Around 5 am. That was the sky just before the sun rose. Which means that the orange in this photo is technically fire, but it’s the fire that arrives every day to nourish our planet. The colour orange is one of my favourites. I love its heat and intensity. I like having it around my house in art and lamps and cushions. I like wearing orange because it makes me feel warm and alive. I like discovering orange in nature because it’s so vivid.

But I don’t think I’ll ever view the colour orange the same way again. What I used to see as hot beauty is seared in my mind as wildfire flames, all-consuming, rapacious, deadly. And now I see orange everywhere. The flash of a bright roof through the trees. Is that a fire? The regular flicker of a warning light on the hill above the airport. Is that a fire? The reflection of the setting sun on the windows of the homes across the valley. Is that a fire?

When we were evacuated, I had to write to calm my racing mind. But since we came home, I haven’t been able to create even one worthwhile sentence. So with words failing me, I turned to taking more photos than usual. Photos of the ordinary, of anything that looked normal.

This is the potato ivy in the pot at our front door, the one that’s taking over the sidewalk.

This beautiful garden is near the waterfront downtown. They’re hard to see, but those are orange canna lilies soaring in the background.

This is the bridge linking Kelowna with West Kelowna. In the hazy background are the hills where the Okanagan Mountain Park fire raged in 2003, two decades ago almost to the day.

This is a nearly deserted Bernard Street outdoor seating area in downtown Kelowna on a day when there would normally be lineups to get a table at any restaurant.

It will take some time, but our region will come back from this. And we will always be grateful to the firefighters and police officers who raced to quell the fires and guard our homes as the rest of us had to flee.