For those unaware, I recently moved to Los Angeles where a wildfire is ravaging the Angeles national park only a few miles from where I’m staying. This is my first wildfire experience, but It’s interesting to watch how things progress. Trying to keep on task, we’ve been taking shifts to ensure we don’t miss any evacuation notices from local authorities, and being a night-owl gamer, I’ve offered to take the night shift watching for updates and notices while everyone sleeps.
While this seems like a tedious task, I find myself unafraid of the wildfire only a few miles from me, but I feel strangely comfortable instead, as if the sights of a wildfire spark up a hint of familiarity, as if I’ve been here before and I think I know why.
The smoke from the fire is making its way down the ridges just up the street, creeping into our neighborhood, and as it does tiny flecks of ash begin to fall all around me. As I sit in the patio chairs outside, the smell of burning wood seems out of place…perhaps that’s because I can’t smell burning woods through a television screen. The ash falling like snow, and the smoke, taking place of the dense fog that shrouds the mythical town of Silent hill, all bring back memories so real it haunts my imagination. I previously stated online, that I’m inclined to reach for a portable radio and a flashlight, and step into what is slowly becoming the familiar town I’ve trudged through before.
Even when I’m not outside, the objects in the house still remind me of the familiar, almost ghost-like environment outside. Taking the night shift, it’s pretty obvious that most of the lights are off in the house, making the rooms I walk into poorly lit, conjuring up more imagery of the town I remember so vividly. Led pipes line the garage walls, easily accessible for my venture out into the unknown. The kitchen has always been a good source of supplies; I could easily grab a kitchen knife instead. Even opening the fridge helps to make the situation even more real. As I peer into the fridge, I spy a plastic container filled with juice, and after reading the brand name and juice type, the label reads ‘health drink’ in tiny letters towards the bottom.
While the burning smell seems to bring the reality of the situation at hand closer, it does nothing to distract my imagination, as I’m instantly thinking about Alessa and her revenge birthed from the fires of Silent Hill in the 2006 film. I would imagine that this same smell inhabits the town, and I think the next time I pick up a controller to play, the scent will be forever burned into my brain associating it with Silent Hill. These things kind of distance me from the real dangers of the fire, but while thinking about where exactly the fire is moving, I suddenly remember that Toluca Lake, a body of water in the town of Silent hill, is a real place located here in California, though Silent Hill’s location is ambiguous (it has references to Maine, New England, and the film stated Silent Hill was located in West Virginia). I’m taking the fire seriously, but the comparison cannot be overlooked when it is so startlingly obvious. As the sun rises over the mountains here in California, the smoke seems to thin out a bit, transforming the scenery from a dark, brooding, fog and ash filled haze into a normal town like any other. Sound familiar?
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