And they're all made out of ticky-tacky...

My hairdresser, fondling my scalp with her marijuana-scented fingers remarked that she heard sirens pass the hair salon yesterday afternoon. She pronounced it "Sigh-reens", like she was auditioning for a bit part in O Brother, Where Art Thou? and her delight at hearing the sigh-reens was mitigated just a bit by the fact that there "weren't a whole lot of 'em". After she had manipulated my problem hair into something that passed for a style, she sold me a completely unnecessary bottle of rosemary clarifying shampoo that smelled like paint thinner and I drove home to my little compound of ecru quadplexes nestled like tiles between giant mocha-colored piles of earth, as if our domains were Mayan temples situated among long-forgotten burial grounds.

I turned right onto my street, paying more attention to the dripping iced tea I was balancing between my knees than the road in front of me and almost hit a police car blocking the two lanes to my house. A portly man who looked like Captain Kangaroo in a service uniform motioned for me to roll down the window and told me I couldn't get through, that a unit was burning down near the cul-de-sac. I saw smoke coming from the general vicinity of my house and leaped out of my car, sprinting toward the fire. It was a series of stops and starts...full out running to make sure it wasn't mine, and a pause each time I realized it COULD be me and what would I do? My jerky progress was interrupted once in awhile by groups of strolling rednecks, alternately horrified and excited by the scene and breaking out coolers of Busch in their Dale Earnhardt festooned garages. If my neighborhood weren't so transient, I would imagine our block parties would look similar.

I folded my hands across the front of my shirt and walked with my head down, bracing against the gale winds that charged down the street. I had forgotten a coat, and the yokels were giving me odd looks as I hustled to get to the fire. I wonder if they thought I was one of the residents, in shock and wandering aimlessly while my possessions turned to ash inside my house. If they did, their concern didn't seem evident and we mutually avoided one another's eyes as I passed.

I reached the turn around of our cul-de-sac and drew in a sharp breath, partly out of relief because it wasn't my unit, and partly because the one next to me was completely engulfed in fire. I expected people to be crying, to be milling about and wailing for one another and their possessions, but I only saw firemen trying to outpace the wind with their hoses and a cluster of grim-faced Midwesterners, pulling flannel jackets and bathrobes tighter over their shoulders as they watched their life burn away. I suppose when you live in a place like I do, there aren't many things inside to be destroyed, and the pioneer mentality supersedes sentiment; times are hard, they'll always be hard, and we'll pick up and move on even if God shits on us again like he did today.

I asked a nearby policeman if I could go into my house and he stroked his mustache, considering.

"Way-ull...", he responded in a nearly pitch-perfect imitation of John Wayne, "I heard the unit next to the one on fire might be in danger of exploding if the fire gets into the gas lines somehow, but since you're one of the interiors you should be okay. Just start runnin' if you hear popping sounds."

Cold comfort, but I was freezing and at the very least I could grab my coat. I sat at my office window and watched the activity for a bit before I left, noting how the displaced residents sat like monoliths in the ambulances parked all around the neighborhood. They didn't speak and sat ramrod straight, maybe mentally willing the day to be over, or to just rewind. I watched the firemen and policemen cart out smoldering furniture and douse it with water in the middle of the yards. Neon orange condemned notices were put up on all four doors, and the front screen doors, loose on the hinges now from so many shoves and slams, fluttered like Kleenex on their hinges.

I've become fairly desensitized to human tragedy recently, I suppose like everyone has, but this has been weighing on my mind so much. There's the obvious thought that this could've easily happened to me, and that I should probably get renter's insurance as soon as possible in case my neighbors get careless with a cigarette or a firecracker, but more so the idea that a simple accident could ruin not only my life but four sets of lives as well. That my neighbors, whom I absolutely do not trust or like, might have to help me get out of our burning house someday. That we are intertwined, by contractual obligation if not by choice, and that those nameless people I waved at each morning as we pulled out of our driveways for work aren't going to be there anymore. That their lives have been incontrovertibly altered, and that they may never feel safe in their homes again.

Just...wow.