PERSPECTIVES ON THE FIRES : A Message of Value Carried by Ashes : We who were spared must wonder what it’s like to leave home in the morning and find all gone by nightfall.

There were ashes all over. They fell from the sky softly like snowflakes--white, gray and black remnants of brush fires burning all around Los Angeles County. They covered the ground, the cars and the trees around my apartment. They fell on my eyelashes and clung to my hair and clothes. Some were delicate, white wisps that crumbled to the touch; others were black tendrils of what probably had been green leaves or stalks till a couple of hours ago.

One fairly large piece fluttered down onto the grass. I picked it up. It did not break apart. It was like a gray wafer biscuit, curled up and speckled with black spots. I wondered what it could have been before it was incinerated and transported across the gray skies. Was it part of a branch of a tree that grew in somebody’s back yard where birds perched and sang? Or was it a frond from a bush in the wilderness beyond, struggling against harsh winds to hold on to the mountainside? Was it part of a dining table that a housewife lovingly polished every day? The remains of a baby’s crib? A doghouse?

What I held in my palm could have been part of the charred remains of someone’s dreams, someone’s memories, someone’s pride or prize, all turned to dust with scarcely a warning.

On street after street, all that remained were the fireplaces. They were all shapes and sizes, standing starkly above smoldering rubble. How many families had spent cold winter nights in front of those fireplaces, eating popcorn, drinking wine, sharing stories or just snuggling together and watching the cheerful flames dance up the chimney? Did they ever think that one day, all that would remain of their homes would be the chimneys?

Could the people leaving their homes on what seemed like a normal Wednesday morning even imagine that they would never set foot in it their homes again? Mothers packing off their children to school, fathers worrying about the day ahead at work, must have stepped out of their homes preoccupied with routine thoughts: What to cook for dinner tonight. What to wear to the party. Which car to buy. Whether to build a deck overlooking the ocean. How to ask the boss for time off. Where to go for the holidays.

And now it wouldn’t matter at all. All that they thought mattered most in the world had been reduced to ashes. The things that husbands and wives quarreled about, that parents scolded their children for and that children grumbled against were nothing compared to the one thing that they now had intact: their lives.

It must have been extremely difficult for people who were home when the fires roared down canyons and hillsides into their neighborhood. They tried to cling as long as possible to their possessions, dousing their rooftops and trees with water until the inferno forced them to evacuate. Those who had the means tried to take away everything they could. If they had time, they brought out valuable documents, treasured heirlooms, precious ornaments that had been stored away for safekeeping. Others had to make split-second decisions, and they took what seemed to be most valuable. They hurried down the street with their cars full of pets, appliances, clothing, toys. Most people didn’t even have that small luxury. They were away when the fire struck, and they hurried back to find that all of their possessions did not exist anymore.

All they had left were the clothes on their back and the cars that they had driven off in that morning. Everything they had worked for had gone up in smoke. All the furniture and the appliances that they had bought to make their lives easy were gone. All their cherished mementos had been turned to ash: baby’s gilded bootees that had stood on the mantel; the wedding gown that had been stored carefully in a box in the closet; the honeymoon pictures and vacation souvenirs; the movie of the baby taking her first steps; the silverware that Grandma had left in her will.

Books that had been bought one by one from thrift shops, garage sales and swap meets and had lined the custom-made shelves ended up feeding the flames. All the clothes, perfumes, shoes, the cutlery and dishes, the computers and cameras, the jewelry and trinkets that they had accumulated over the years were gone. They had spent hours queuing behind cash registers to buy those things. They had spent entire days rushing up and down the crammed freeways to get to those sales.

And when it really came down to what they had left, it was the fundamentals that had value. What really mattered was to be alive. Life was greater than a dream house, a luxury car or the latest computer game. Their houses may have been razed to the ground, but they still had their lives. And they had the chance of starting anew.