Missi Dowd-Figueroa introduced life again to the fire-ravaged plot the place her dwelling as soon as stood—one sunflower at a time.
The registered nurse and mom of three misplaced her 1898 farm-style home within the Eaton Fireplace, certainly one of two lethal wildfires that tore by the Los Angeles space final January, obliterating complete neighborhoods and displacing tens of 1000’s of individuals.
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A yr later, many are nonetheless grappling with grief and sorrow. Few have been capable of rebuild up to now, and the remaining face no scarcity of challenges.
“The Altadena I do know and love is gone,” Dowd-Figueroa stated, referring to the suburb devastated by the hearth. “Every little thing burned down — my dentist, my pharmacy — all of it’s gone. However there’s nonetheless one thing about Altadena that looks like Altadena now, regardless that there are not any houses.”
She’s amongst those that determined to remain. Her technique of therapeutic began with tiny seeds that gave her hope and finally turned her barren property right into a flourishing backyard.
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Dowd-Figueroa and her household had lived within the four-bedroom, three-bath home for 10 years. It was the longest she’d ever lived in a single place, and the sense of loss left her affected by waves of unhappiness.
For months, she would drive to the empty lot and cry. Her grief and shock deepened when she realized that, along with her late grandmother’s art work that was in her dwelling, her father’s ashes have been gone perpetually.
“I spent a number of days digging by the ashes simply on the lookout for his little urn, and I by no means discovered it,” stated Dowd-Figueroa, 44.
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Gone, too, have been each household photograph besides these saved on her iPad.
“That was like a second grief, too. I used to be like, ‘Effectively, nice.’ Now, if my dad knew, he’d be so dissatisfied as a result of he was such a household lineage sort of individual,” she stated. “I’ve nothing from my father. You recognize, I’ll by no means contact something that he touched ever once more.”
Then sooner or later, after cleanup crews had eliminated the final of the particles from the two,000-square-foot lot, she introduced alongside some flower seeds. They have been largely sunflowers, but additionally included zinnias and cosmos, amongst others, and planted them within the soil.
“I used to be already going there daily crying, so I used to be like, ‘Why am I simply sitting right here?’ I would as properly do one thing that retains me busy, and I take pleasure in, as a result of the home I’m in now, I can’t have a backyard,” she stated.
Sunflowers can take up cadmium and different heavy metals that may be left behind within the soil, although specialists debate their effectiveness after a wildfire. Dowd-Figueroa hoped they might assist take away toxins on her property as soon as she ripped them out by the roots and tossed them after they died, being cautious to not depart behind seeds.
For a number of months, whereas Dowd-Figueroa and her husband took steps towards finally constructing a brand new dwelling, the backyard flourished, blanketing a big swath of the lot with a colourful show of roughly 500 flowers — vivid orange and pink ones, in addition to yellow ones with large heads.
“It was actually therapeutic simply to come back again and have a tendency the house the place I lived for the longest time in my life,” she stated.
Butterflies started to appear, together with a wide range of bugs and small animals.
“I felt like I used to be serving to nature come again a little bit bit,” she stated.
Building started on Dowd-Figueroa’s new dwelling in late September, thanks partly to round $100,000 in donations by way of a fundraising web site. By then, the sunflowers, most of which bloom as soon as after which die, have been practically all gone.
That’s OK. With development continuing and estimated to be accomplished as quickly as mid-June, the slowly rising form of her new house is now lifting Dowd-Figueroa’s spirits.
“Previous to this, I used to be simply so depressed, like actually sobbed daily,” she stated. “It simply looks like now there’s a spot that exists. It’s going to occur. We will do that.”
Related Press reporter Dorany Pineda contributed from Los Angeles.
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