Lucky Pussy

Cale got tagged by a Gaper

Only Cale would slide around on a frozen creek . . . in shorts

My favorite boy and my favorite beer.

Tomo dressed porker up for halloween!

Sending pics from my phone

One thing that always makes me happy is this little guy.

Pass in hand

I need your help

Dear God,

I know you are busy but PLEASE PLEASE, if you get a spare moment, Tahoe could really use some attention. We are trying to keep our heads above water but the undertow is overpowering. It seems every time we pledge to remain optimistic, another wave of chaos slams right into us. Then we are swimming (actually more like flailing around) in a sea of depression, anger, fear and desperation. Right now, it is taking all of our power just to not drown. I wouldn't ask if I felt I had any other option. I, we, have tried everything. We don't require much. Just a little reminder that you are out there. People are starting to doubt it. All we need is a little taste of winter so we can start repairing our hearts and souls and stop questioning what we are even doing here in the first place. I have faith that with the first real snow will come the first real happiness this town has seen in months. I know it sounds like a frivolous request but snow is what our culture relies upon. Its what brought us all together, it is our way of life. Everyone needs something to believe in, something to count on, some place to let go of all the trivialities and anxieties that consume us. For many snow and winter are the closest they ever feel to you. So I am sitting here hoping, wishing and praying that if you hear this you will help send some snow our way. We need it, our very lives depend on it. Things around here are bad God, and with a little snow, we will find the strength to begin fixing them. I love you.

Jenna
South Lake Tahoe, CA/NV

I am greatful for my team

Hmm. Sorry about the last post...It has been a long autumn. I am trying to let it all go and just concentrate on the impending ski season, that better come soon dammit! As my best friend keeps telling me BE TUFF DOYLE, so that is what I am trying to do. This may be easy for most people but when you are a chronic overanalyzer and obsessive worrier it can be quite the challege at times. For now i am putting the "what ifs" behind and putting my skis on, team shadow is ready to rock.

Northstar, my favorite (though dont tell anyone i said Northstar and not Sierra) mountain is opening one week from today and will hopefully become my safe haven. Then life will get even better when Sierra opens and life will be back to normal and all will be well with the world. It is incredible to think about how, at least for my friends, life and attitudes change so much with the season. Fall is a dark time in Tahoe which pretty much starts with Agro August.

By mid August the resorts have been closed for 3 1/2 months, we havent been camping and skiing for 2 months and summer has officially taken over. Summer in Tahoe is beautiful and there are pleanty of other things to keep us occupied, camping, sailing, bike riding...but no matter what we tell ourselves, deep down we all know that what really gets our hearts racing is the snow. Even though we know we shouldnt, we can not stop ourselves from thinking about it. Only a few months and we will be skiing again, can you believe it. As summer starts winding down, school starts, the lake gets to cold to swim in, business becomes almost nonexistant, these few months start to feel like a few years. The mood is aggrivated, relationships fall apart, we drink our sorrows away and then BAM! its Halloween and we are all broke as shit with nothing to do and the snow really NEEEEEDS to start falling.

November has proven a little brighter, the weather has finally turned cold, we break out all the winter clothes from the garage and put away the boardshorts but alas still no damn snow. Some of us are working through our personal turmoils together, which makes it a little less lonely and a little more managable. Now we will be able to but all the bull shit of lifes inadaquacies on the backburner and live in a state of pure bliss and excitement for the next 5 months.

I want to say thank you to the team, Clif Cale Meg and Tom, its been a rough one but we've made it through, its almost over, and at least we have eachother as we head into Winter.



My last thought: Lets not get ahead of ourselves. We all know our weaknesses. Though I realize it is impossible to make it through the winter without a few trips to the emergency room lets try to leave it at stitches. Let us remain mindfull of our sholders, thighs, wrists, knees and backs and quit while we are ahead. When the pain takes over, leave it for the day, we will always be back tomorrow.

And I think we all agree that life could only be better if we had our Micaela with us every day.

Torn

What do you do when you want two completely different things at the same time? What if you want the comfort and security of something old and familiar but also the adventure and uncertainty of something new and exciting? What do you do when you know that either decision you make will destroy the other?

I want the opportunity to try something new without sacrificing what I already have. Is this wrong? Maybe. Is it selfish? Probably. Can I help it? NO!

Lately I just feel like the things I have been the most sure about in the past are suddenly and unexpectedly shifting out of focus. I have been made aware for the first time in my adult life that maybe there are other possibilities, other outcomes to my existence. I want to be totally selfish and try new things on the whim that they might be the best things I ever do. What if I try something new and realize it isn't as sweet as it sounds?

I want to know the outcome of both paths before I can decide which one to follow. Impossible I know.

Cont...

Also would like to say happy birthday to Jordan Fortier October 5, Meriwhether Morris October 11 and Cristin Coleman October 12! I Miss all of you

Belated Birthdays

This is a tribute to Tomo's birthday WEEK. It was wild...I think I have just barely recovered. The first picture is how we all started to view the world after a couple of days. They are in reverse order because blogger is really pissing me off and it is too hard to move pictures. I love you Tomo! Good Times.

Im Optomistic

Ok so I finally woke up to some snow....yes thats right when I opened my eyes I thought it was raining but it was in fact snowing!!! I was way late to work because I stayed home and made breakfast with hot chocolate and of course marshmallows and then watched it snow while we had our first early morning fire! Hopefully this is a turning point...pictures to come.

Bad Karma

So I haven't quite figured out what I did to have such bad karma lately but whatever it was it wasn't pretty and I am paying for it now.

Two nights ago one of my best friends tried to commit suicide. I rushed down to the bay to be with her. I got back yesterday.

Today I get a call from my dad saying that my grandmother is on life support and they will be taking her off of it tomorrow morning. So I find myself for the second time in 3 days frantically trying to get my affairs in order so that I can rush yet again back to the beautiful northbay. Awesome!

Hope your day is going better than mine.

Just one of those days...unfortunately this is turning out to be VERY true

Inspiration

If ever asked about what inspires me the answer would be simple.
My father because he has harnessed pure passion and is one of the few individuals i know who is truly at peace with themselves. These are the two things I aspire to find every day.

What inspires you?

Happy Birthday Bob!

September 3 was my dads birthday. I was lucky enough to be able to spend it with him. So this one goes out to the best guy I know. Happy Birthday Dad!

This summer I also got to watch the Giants kick ass with my dad.

Getting back to my roots

On another trip to Santa Rosa I was by chance able to meet up with one of my long time best friends Danelle. She happened to have stopped to visit her grandparents on the way back from her summer vacation in Florida and the northern California Coast. Every time we get together a certain unexplainable energy seems to start flying around us. Its a combination of extreme excitement and extreme comfort. I can not help but smile or laugh every time I look at the girl. We spent a wonderful afternoon at the Bodega Bay Seafood Art and Wine Festival, eating amazingly fresh seafood (something you don't find in the mtns very often), sampling local wines and listening to Tommy Castro while wandering through all of the art exhibits. I couldn't think of anyone I would have rather gone with. Before heading back into town we ran around on our favorite beach and dipped our feet in that oh so refreshing north coast water. It will really wake you up. I stood there for a long time remembering how many memories we had made at that foggy, cliffy, sandy old stretch of beach. For me pure nostalgia.

While in town, Cale and I also spent a day in San Francisco roaming around the city during the day and then met up with my brother and his friend in the evening and went to the first day of the Outsidlands Music Festival where we saw Manu Chao and Radiohead. A fantastic day. I have never seen a picture of myself this excited to be dancing....if that is even what I was trying to do.

Missing Miss Micaela

A couple of weeks ago Cale and I went to Santa Rosa where we met up with an old friend of ours who no longer lives in Tahoe. Micaela and her boyfriend Jeff were on a road trip down the California coast from Oregon. We had a great time catching up over some wine tasting and delicious dinner! I can not wait to go visit these two this winter in Mt. Hood. Micaela is truly a great friend and seeing her that weekend made me realize how few and far between really good friends are, I wish I got to see you everyday Mica lica.

My life from the perspective of one of my alter egos

Just one of those people who has been sucked into the Tahoe trap and can't leave...and wouldn't have it any other way. Every morning I wake up with the Forest in my backyard and the Lake in my front. I try to work as little as possible and play as much as I can. The people who inspire me are those individuals who are stoked every morning for the adventures of a brand new day, who care more about their friends and family than their jobs, who see the beauty and opportunity of 5 feet of powder, who appreciate the emergency room, who live on the edge and have found peace of mind. My advice to you....Try something new today.

Two people who make me the happiest

Angelina Marie Carmignani

Danelle Marie Aubrey

Agro August

I am ready for a change. Something needs to change. Something HAS to change. . . suggestions????

Oh Nooo is it happening again? Angora revisited

I can still hear its roar.
Like an enormous wave that can't wait to consume everything in its path.

Last year there was a fire in South Lake Tahoe. Before this I knew of fires, knew that California had an extremely high danger for fires, knew of a few big fires in the past few years, even knew of one person whose house was burnt down in San Diego. But before last year I never KNEW fire.
Cale and I were at the grocery store and on our way home saw a small billow of smoke a few miles in the distance. Thats not good we thought as we didnt see any fire trucks or here sirens. Maybe we should check it out. We drove a few miles to a neighborhood directly on opposite side of the mountain ridge we live beneath. We didnt see any flames and went home to get ready for work. On the way to work we figured we should check it out one more time. Just to make sure. What I saw that day is something I will never forget and something I hope none of you will ever understand.

There were flames everywhere. This was a FOREST FIRE, think about that for a minute, not a brush fire or a desert fire but a freakin forest fire! Now the forest I live in is made up of hundreds of thousands of 80-100 feet tall trees and the "canopy" was on fire. What this means is that 80-100 feet above our heads there was a blanket of fire in the tree tops soooo hottt and spreading soooo fast that it could not be slowed or stopped. It invoked an immediate feeling of panic, distress and TERROR.

Below the canopy was chaos. Everywhere you looked houses were on fire. Hot branches and embers were raining down everywhere. It all happened so fast that no one knew what was going on. Even the law enforcement was in awe. There were officers parked on the side of the road just watching in horror and not doing a damn thing. I rolled down my window and yelled "help these people cant you see their lives are burning down in front of them!" They all just stared blankly. It was the people like myself who were just driving by that were trying to help. Everyone was out of their cars running in strangers houses trying to evacuate important belongings or throwing buckets of water on the roof still hoping that there was some way, there had to be some way, that their house would be spared. That their house wouldnt burn down like their next door neighbors....ALL THE HOUSES BURNED DOWN. Every last one of them. All of those people I saw that day, the ones I tried to help and the ones I didnt lost EVERYTHING. Everything they owned, collected, cherished even hated. They lost it all in a matter of 15minutes. Each of them spent the first 10 trying to spray down their houses, in denial of what was actually happening and the last 5 frantically grabbing what they could and getting the hell out of there. What would you grab in 5 minutes. Your pictures, heirlooms, important documents, jewelery, pets, children, medication....5 minutes thats all they had.

Two things stand out to me most from that day and still haunt me. The first is a man yelling at the same officers I did that his roof was on fire, it was on fire and no one was helping. He was all alone with a hose, soo alone with that hose....and the officers looked on, they had already cut their loses, but they werent their loses to cut. They should have helped, done something. Even if the end result was the same at least they couldnt be blamed for trying.
The second was a family upon realizing what was happening. A little boy runs down the street after his dog, the father runs after the boy saying we have to leave the dog, he ran into the forest we have to go NOW! (which was true, there came a point when everyone just HAD TO GO, pets or no pets, leave or die) Meanwhile the mother is standing outside her house hysterical, "what are we going to do, what are we going to do" she kept repeating "this is our house, this is our life, what are we going to do" while her 16 year old daughter was trying to pull her back, "its ok mom, its going to be ok, get in the car we have to go now...we HAVE TO GO, MOM GET IN THE CAR, its going to be ok" but its not ok. That girl kept her composure but woke up the next day homeless and without everything she loved, just like her mother.

Now everything is gone, they have no where to live, their lives are changed forever and people like me left feeling guilty, why wasnt it my stuff not theirs, I only rent, I dont have anything important, why am I so helpless.

The days that followed werent much better. hundreds of houses were burning the wind was howling and the fire was out of control. In the coming days it spread up the mountain and down the other side towards my house. For three days we waited....waited for what we knew was coming. waited for what we had already seen. Waited and felt guilty, guilty that we had time to pack, time to take inventory, time to cram our cars full of all the stuff we wanted to save. Waited and were ashamed, ashamed to be driving around town in cars packed so full of 23 years worth of belongings that no one could have any passengers, ashamed that those people from North Upper Truckee didnt have anything to show for the past 10-20-50 years of their lives. No baby pictures, no wedding pictures, no pictures of their own children, so souvenirs from the far off lands they had once visited and to which they would never return...nothing. We were staying in hotels and at friends houses and were even more guilty and ashamed each morning when we drove back to the neighborhood and our houses were still standing. On the second night we didnt even leave. We took turns sleeping in shifts on the living room floor because for some reason it just felt better, felt right. The town shut down. No one was enjoying themselves and the ones that were made me want to scream. The damn tourists going "this sucks why is it so smoky? I heard there is a fire or something" Open you eyes people, its less that five miles from anywhere you are in town. If you are on a hill you can see the flames in the distance.

We fought till the last moment. We sprayed our roofs down like everyone else, we breathed through wet t-shirts tied around our faces like masks. When the fire was lapping at our neighbors back porch we broke into his house found his keys and dog and drove his car and packed trailer the hell out of there. When it threatened our other neighbors house we grabbed our snow shovels and started digging dirt and trying to cover up the spot fires in the meadow behind their house. We watched as their back fence broke down. Watched as their family collapsed in tears at the realization there was nothing to be done. That after all that waiting we just had to leave. We ran back in our houses until the cops were knocking on our door dragging us out threatening to arrest us if we didnt get in our cars and leave. So we all left. Everyone congregated at the bottom of the hill and watched, and still waited. Our landlord was crying everyone was crying. We went to our friends house and hiked up there hill from which we could see the seen the mountain of flames we only assumed had probably burned our house down. We watched the local channel which kept us "up to date" for hours all we saw was Gardner Mountain under siege, with a picture of our house as we had left it. What a tease. was it still there, how could they still be showing that. It showed us leaving, the firemen moving in and then a still shot of our house, on repeat for hours.

The next morning we woke up (if anyone actually slept im not sure) and wondered was it still there, was there anyway they were still there, only one way to find out. We drove "home" and drove around all the cones and barriers advising us not to enter. We drove straight to our house and were greeted by all our neighbors still crying in front of our houses that were still standing. There were fire trucks parked in everyones driveways, we all had our personal crews. The wind had shifted in the night, blowing the fire along the line of backyards that bordered the forest. Back fences and yards were burnt but all the houses on my street prevailed. We no longer have the luscious green meadow or trees that were hundreds of years old and will take hundreds of years to be replaced, but we had houses. We had belongings. I remember being so happy and so sad all at the same time. Relieved that it was over for me. Though while the fire still raged for a few more days I wouldnt have to wait for it to eat me anymore.

We owe our livelihood to these firemen, these guys and hundreds of others were posted outside our hoses for days staying up all night. The coffee and food we brought them can never express our gratitude. THANK YOU!

I still start to cry when I think about that first day. Think about that man and that family and think about their loss. I find a little comfort in how fortunate my neighbors many of which had lived on the block for 20+ years. But still i feel sadness, anguish for those who were not so lucky for those no one could help.


Today Yosemite is on fire. At 5:45 this morning Cale woke up out of a dead sleep and smelled it. A smell not everyone is terrified of, a smell that most associate as campfire or roasting marshmallows, a smell that most would disregard. Cale smelled it and jumped out of bed so fast I thought our house was already burning down. He ran outside, ran back inside, turned on the tv, turned on the internet and searched for the fire that we knew must be just around the corner. Half asleep I started making a list in my head...OK: Cat, hard drive, computer, passports, jewelery, teddy bear, scrapbooks, my boat from Italy, Cale's Grandfathers knife collection, my parents expensive paintings. That would be my five minute list. Forget everything else, thats what I need. Luckily I didnt have to run around frantically actually trying to grab these things in five minutes but damn we went from dead sleep to panic and then flight mode in about 15 seconds flat. I could see it vividly, how it would play out. How sad it was that I was actually prepared for a disaster like this, like standing in the doorway during an earthquake, if there is another forest fire we will all know what to do.