January 17, 2025 • 48 mins
In this episode of Deeply Well, Devi shares her personal experiences and reflections on the recent wildfires in Los Angeles. She discusses the emotional impact of the fires, her deep connection to the city, and the resilience of the community. Devi emphasizes the importance of service and support during such crises, highlighting the need for individual contributions to help those affected. The episode serves as a heartfelt reflection on the beauty and challenges of living in Los Angeles, as well as a call to action for listeners to engage in meaningful ways to support their communities.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:27):
Take a deep breath in through your nose.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Holds it.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Now, release slowly again, deep in, helle hold release, repeating
(01:02):
internally to yourself as you connect to my voice.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
I am deeply well. I am deeply deep well. I
am deeply.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
Wow well.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
I'm Debbie Brown and this is the Deeply Well Podcast.
Welcome to Deeply Well, a soft place to land on
your journey. A podcast for those that are curious, creative,
and ready to expand in higher consciousness and self care.
(01:53):
This is where we heal, this is where we transcend.
Welcome back to another episode. I'm Debbie Brown. Of course
this is Deeply Well, and my goodness, this episode is
a little bit different. I'm actually sitting in my kitchen
recording this episode, staring out the window as we have
(02:18):
had one of the toughest times in Los Angeles in
recent history. This episode, I'm going to be talking about
the LA fires, and I think my approach to this
episode is I want to share with you my experience
and some of the ways that I've been looking at
(02:40):
this experience. This is not necessarily an episode that is
going to be super supportive in terms of resources. I
do feel that there is some incredible information out there
that is easily accessible. So I don't know if it
would be the best use of our connection or if
that's how I can best service to share things that
(03:03):
I know are really adequately getting around. It's been profound
and incredible to see the response of aid in the
world and in the community, and especially on Instagram. It
feels like there are so many well vetted services and
charities and ways to connect with different demographics of people
(03:25):
that have been displaced or harmed or broken by this
tragedy and by this natural disaster. And so I trust
that those resources are available for those that are looking
for a way to serve and to help in this moment.
I found the resources to be incredible for myself. One
(03:48):
of my focuses that ways I'm looking to really serve
is to help single moms that have been displaced by
this buyer, who have lost things or need help in
this moment. So that is an area actively looking to
serve children and looking to serve single parents and just
looking to serve. So I am right along there with everyone,
(04:09):
and I've been really grateful my dear friend DJ Head,
who's been a friend of mine for nearly twenty years.
In the La area. His page at djhad is where
I've been finding a lot of amazing resources and opportunities
to get in touch with people and to serve. LAist
is another site that I've been looking at a lot,
(04:31):
and of course, you know some of the bigger ones.
I found that KTLA five is giving a lot of
reporting and coverage that feels really useful to me. So
I hope that everyone is doing what they can. And
if you felt called to help us here in this city,
I hope you're connected to the resource that feels most appropriate,
(04:51):
most authentic, and most deeply connected to the way that
you can show up in service and in your gifts.
This episode, I kind of to talk about what it
is to feel your way through an experience like this
and a natural disaster. So I want to share a
little bit about my love for this beautiful, beautiful city.
(05:17):
If you've listened to this podcast, and especially if you
have connected with my work prior to the last decade,
something that used to always be in my Twitter and
Instagram bio it used to also be in my regular
bio is that I always would put down that I'm
a West Coast enthusiast, and it's something that actually Charlemagne
(05:41):
speaks to a lot about me. It's a big part
about our early relationship is I used to be the
quintessential La girl, LA sweetheart, running around in Chuck Taylor's
with the West Coast dub on my hand, at all
the LAS shows and concerts, and deeply in the community
(06:02):
of Los Angeles. When I had the opportunity to be
the director of community service at the radio station I
used to work at, we would create things within the
city and within the inner city, summer programs and concert series,
and I know every inch of this city and it's
something that I'm very, very very very proud of. I
(06:25):
have always considered LA to be my soulmate and something
that I think gets misunderstood about LA, especially if you're
a transplant or if you just look at LA from
the outside looking in. You know, the thing about people
that are born and raised in LA, and I have
always felt exceptionally proud, honored and lucky to be born
(06:49):
and raised in LA, is that we don't see Los
Angeles through the lens that the outside world does. We're
not looking at LA is opportunity, and Los Angeles has
roughly around eighteen million people in it, the population is massive.
We are one of the biggest economies in the world.
(07:09):
I think we're the fifth biggest economy in the entire globe.
Our weather is representative of only one percent of the world.
So certain things about it do make it naturally just
truthfully a very rare experience, which is not to say
it's better than anywhere else that anybody is from. I
(07:32):
think God places us exactly where we are, and every
place has its power and its beauty and its specialness.
But to be born and raised in La and to
be awake to the contrast that is LA is something
that is so different. And my relationship with this city,
I've always referred to the city itself as my soulmate.
(07:52):
And even when I had chances to have a successful,
beautiful life and other great cities like Manhattan, Brookland, and
I lived in both of those for years. When I
had the opportunity to live in Houston, Texas. These are
cities that are rich in culture and beauty and incredible,
but there was never a time I didn't long to
(08:13):
be home. And I think for so many of us
that are born and raised in La, again, we don't
look at this city as opportunity. We don't look at
this city as someplace we move to, you know, maybe
rise or be creative or you know, live our dreams.
It's just our city. It's just where we're from, you know.
And so we know it. We don't really congregate in
(08:37):
the areas that you see on TV. We don't really
you know, choose to live in Hollywood, or choose to
live in West Hollywood even or choose to live in
downtown LA. Like, we understand the vastness and the profound
diversity that is in this city. And when people come
here and they say they don't like it or they
don't understand it, it's a city that requires something of you,
(09:00):
you know, and it's a city that in some ways
you have to earn its respect. It's not just about
what you can come here and take, or the way
that this city is amplifies one owns ego or optics
or ability to earn or succeed. It's a city that
is incredibly resilient, that is living polarity in every second.
(09:24):
And so whenever people are transplants here and they complain
about the city, it really, to me always highlights just
a bigger insecurity or time not spent enough creating a
life here. A lot of people move here to create career,
to create content, to create a perception that they want
(09:46):
the people in the world or in the cities that
they're from to have about them. But this city is
its own, and you know, just like the saying for
New Yorkers, very similar in how protective we are of
where we're from to those that are or native New Yorkers.
But if you can make it here, you can make
it anywhere. But the idea that you can come to
(10:06):
La and it all makes sense at once is silly.
It's a city of nearly twenty million people that is
spread out for miles and miles and miles, with every
single crevice representing something different and being different. It is
a true melting pot where our diversity is vast and
(10:30):
it's interconnected, and we all have a deep respect for
one another and for the cultures that make this city
this city. I thought Kendrick's last album was one of
the most beautiful, beautiful dedications to a place so special.
It wove the culture together and it also showed the resilience.
(10:53):
And I talked about this a lot in the episode
I did about integrity The Art of Integrity, where discussed
Kendrick's incredible career in his connection to the city, and
LA is something else entirely, and it is not Hollywood.
Hollywood is the place of transplants, in the place of projection.
(11:15):
It's really not DTLA.
Speaker 4 (11:17):
You know.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
When I was growing up, my mom for over twenty
years worked at a law firm in downtown LA. So
as a latchkey kid, as an only child to a
single parent, Downtown LA was a huge part of my childhood,
to the point where, if I'm being honest, I really
can't stand to go to it now because I don't
really recognize it. It feels like Downtown LA has been
(11:40):
trying by people that are not from LA to be
transformed into New York. But it's not and it's not
what it was ever designed to be. When I was
growing up, my mom would work extra shifts and do
overtime in downtown LA, and I remember by six pm
it was a literal goal because people didn't live there.
(12:02):
That's where the primary housing for unhoused people was found,
and a part of the city that some may have
heard of that was referred to as skid row. It
was a tough place to be. But it was also
all commerce, and so when we'd go there on the weekends,
we'd have to pack a lunch because no businesses were open,
(12:23):
no restaurants were open. The cities. You know, it looked
like there should have been a huge like dust ball
going through it. It was that empty all the time
in non nine to five hours. I had the chance
growing up to see and understand this city in a really,
really unique way. We moved all over all the time,
(12:48):
and it gave me such a beautiful look at what
the truth and the heart of this city is. For
parts of my childhood, I lived deeply within South Central
and that was I was born in the mid eighties,
and so that was living in a city right after
(13:09):
in a part of the city that was ravaged by crack,
that was ravaged by police brutality, that was ravaged ravaged
by gangs, by death, by drug addiction, it was ravaged
by incarceration. It's an area of the city that so
(13:30):
many men were ripped out of homes. There were so
so much governmental inequity and systemic oppression and planned and
executed oppression from all over from the government, from so
(13:52):
many different systems within the city. It's a place that
has taken a brutal beating since the White Flight had,
you know, towards the fifties and the sixties, and it's
a place that's been ravaged. And some of the way
God has directed and ordered my life is that I
am always keenly, keenly aware of contrast. I am always
(14:15):
keenly aware of polarity and duality. And so for someone
who is a double Gemini, whose part of my life's
journey is about serving humanity and recognizing the contrast of humanity,
Los Angeles was often a feast for my senses as
(14:37):
a child. I remember in these long commutes my mom
and I would have. I remember driving through all the
parts of the city and understanding it on a soul level.
When you drive through Rodeo Drive and you see what
life looks like there, or you're driving through Manhattan Beach
or Venice, and then thirty minutes later you're also driving
(15:00):
through or you're driving through Larchmont Village or Hancock Park,
and then you make it to your stop in South Central.
You see the differences, right. You see you're exposed to
potential and possibility, but you also see profound and fairness,
(15:20):
and you see that some people, you know, experience life
quite differently from others. So that's something I've always watched
and studied and one of the things that I find
so deep and beautiful about this city. So for part
of my young life, that was my home. For part
(15:41):
of my young life, I also lived in parts of
the cities that were almost one hundred percent Mandarin speaking.
I remember for a portion of my life I lived
in an area called Alhambra, which was most of the
businesses there are Chinese owned and operated, and the language
really revolves around that. So that was a cultural feast
(16:03):
for me in understanding and in exposures, and also experiencing
some alienation because when you come and you're one of
the only people a handful of people that look like
you and your school or in those parts of the city,
and the cultural identity is so strong, there's not really
a lot of crossing the lines. That's what it felt like.
(16:27):
And for other parts of my life, I was in
parts of the city that were primarily exclusively Spanish speaking
and were representative of first generation immigrating from Mexico and
the families building their lives and their businesses and their
futures in those spaces and being able to be witnessed too,
(16:50):
and not necessarily always a part of but witness too.
Very strong, beautiful cultural identity, and in other parts of
my life, you know, I was very connected and always
in Santa Monica, Hancock Park, Larchmont Village. It's where I
went to preschool, was in Larchmont, So I've been around
(17:11):
a lot. Of My family also lived in the South
Bay and in Long Beach, and in San Pedro, and
in Carson and Harbor City, and all these areas that
are night and day from each other. Aside from the
strength and community, but it's always made me feel safe.
There is not a part of the city that I
don't go to that I don't feel safe or comfortable in,
(17:33):
that I don't understand people in and recognize people in.
I moved through all of Greater Los Angeles regularly with
constant ease and grace. It's a city that I was
born in. I was born in Hollywood, a city I
went to college and went to a cal State school here,
went to school at every step of the way, and
(17:55):
it's a city I was blessed to start my career
in before my journey in my mid and late twenties
brought me to a couple other major cities. So to
say that I know this city would be an understatement.
To say that I love this city would be an understatement.
To say that I respect and revere this city and
(18:16):
the people in it would be an understatement. So this
week has been so hard to see so many people
struggling to see the duality and the contrast that is
present even in the areas that have burned, and the
differences of what that might mean to those varying groups
(18:39):
of people from varying economic statuses, and the heartbreak no
matter what your background or economic status is, and the
devastation no matter what and what this means and does
it mean for the potential and possibility of the people affected,
and how they're able or not to move forward generationally
(19:03):
long term. I live in a part of the city
that is called Encino, and I love this area. When
it was time for me to move back to La
God sent it to me in a dream. I had
never really spent time here. It was an area I think,
and this is so funny, and I haven't shared this
(19:24):
story with him even but I remember when I was
sixteen a girlfriend had her birthday party. I think it
was her birthday, her graduation party at the only creole
restaurant in Greater LA. And it was in Encino. And
I remember, keep in mind, when I was in high school,
(19:46):
the Lakers and they still are, but they were life.
So we went to the finals every single year I
was in high school and freshman, sophomore in junior years,
that's when we had our three pet and we won
the championship. It was Shaq, it was Kobe rest in peace,
and it was just such a special time to be
(20:08):
young in this city. And I remember so Lakers were gods,
that they were kings and it was just like and
Dodgers too. It was just such a huge part of
my life in childhood. The Dodgers are my favorite sports
team of all time and baseball is my favorite sport
of all time to watch and to go to games
of one hundred percent because as a child, my mom,
(20:31):
through her job, used to get tickets to go to
Dodger Stadium and to see the Dodgers play. So the
fibers of La run so deep in my soul. But
where was I I remember in Encinel my girlfriend had
(20:51):
her dinner at this place that was called Stevie's Creole
Restaurant doesn't exist anymore, but it was a big deal
in the time, and it was kind of upscale and different.
And I remember we came and outside of Stevie's I
got to meet Derek Fisher for the very first time,
and I remember we were so excited. We're like the
licerus are here. But that memory came coming back. But
(21:16):
so I didn't know really anything about this part of
the city. But when I was thinking about moving back
to La I had a dream about it. And that's
how a lot comes to me. I had a dream
about my son's name seven years before I was pregnant,
and that's how I knew what to name him. And
I very often get dreams about things that I should do,
or places I should invest or places I should live.
(21:39):
So I've had them so often throughout my life that
I trust them immediately. And so when God gave me
that vision, it was like, you will live in and
see you know. I was like, Okay, I don't know
where that is. I don't know who lives there, you know,
but okay, and I found what for me is this
little chunk of heaven and Paradise, and the first few
(22:03):
days of the fire, I was driving into Santa Monica
when the fire broke out, and I just saw these
huge clouds of smoke instantaneously filled the city and I
was like, oh my god, I have to get home now. Initially,
when we have wildfires here, it is something that, especially
if you were born and raised to some extent, is
(22:25):
a regular occurrence. We have what is known as like
a wildfire season in LA And I've been back in
La living full time for the last eight years, and
at least four of those years we have had massive
fires in Malibu, even over by the Getty Center. And
typically my area is affected by both of those because
we're not that far from Malibu, very close to the
(22:48):
Getty Center, and so we would get all the smoke
and all the ash. This was something different entirely. You know.
I had been watching for a couple of days the
fire in Pacific Palace, sayed the fire in Altadena, and
then the fire made it to me, and it's terrifying.
(23:09):
I had a lot of peace in my heart because
I trust God, and my life has been destroyed a
few times, so I also trust my adaptability and my
resilience and God's favor and protection and rebuilding. I know,
nothing on this earth is permanent, but of course you
start to feel and experience the depth of sadness throughout
(23:34):
the city.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
And for all those.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
That are empaths living here and even watching from afar,
you know just what that means. You feel it in
the core of your body. And if you are connected
to this city, especially in a deep way, if you
have been in service to this city, if you study
this city, if you really love and appreciate this city,
it hits you in a way that is just profoundly painful.
(24:00):
And so the fire made it to me last week
and some of the experience that I was having was
I'm a single mom. My son is six and a half.
Is you realize all that you can't do, you know,
when it's in your back door and you're being told
to evacuate, And right where I live. It was by
kind of near the Encino Reservoir, which, thank God, is this,
(24:23):
you know, reservoir of water that a lot of these
incredible firefighters, My god, think you think you think you
thank you, Thank you to these incredible firefighters. Thank you
to the firefighters who firefighting is your life's work. Thank
you to the firefighters who are incarcerated men and women
who have been sacrificing endlessly. Thank you to the police,
(24:46):
thank you, thank you God to the police. Thank you
to our city, our first responders. There's just not enough
words to offer the thanks and the reverence, the gratitude,
the awe that we have for each one of you.
I'm so grateful for your lives. I'm so grateful for
your sacrifice, so grateful for your care, for your concern,
(25:09):
for your power, for your protection.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Deeply well well, and.
Speaker 2 (25:29):
When that happens, you know, when that happened here, you
realize what you can't do, and you realize.
Speaker 4 (25:33):
It could all go.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
And you know, my home is truly a sanctuary. And
it's not something I really share on social media because
it's mine, you know, it's my sacred space, it's my
family's sacred space. It's something that I hold private because
it means a lot, not just to me, but to
the people that are here that spend time here. I
(25:56):
take clients here, my friends and family, and I have
big parties at my house or big cookoffs at my house.
It's a place that is always filled with romance, with moodiness,
with music, with love, with life, with laughter, and so
as I'm watching the news and I'm seeing that it
(26:19):
is here now in my backyard, and it sounds like
war outside because again I'm right by the reservoirs. So
all the helicopters and all the planes are going non stop,
and you're just hearing that, right, You're hearing the choppers.
You're hearing these huge, like miraculous vessels fill with water
(26:40):
and dump water. And yeah, it's something I experience a
lot of life, and my memories are really rooted in
how the nature around me feels as I'm having whatever
experience I'm having, and so things like that really stay
with me on a very deep level. And I'm looking around.
(27:01):
I looked down at my hands and it's me and
my son, and I'm like, I have a bad back
in two hands, I can't save anything. You know. It
just really you think there is a way to pick
and choose what's important to you, and there really isn't
you know. I managed, you know, gratefully. I packed meaningful
things for my son because his life just started, so
(27:22):
that matters more than anything. And then I have a
collection of Tupac signatures that I got that, and you know,
all our important documents and my camera and my computer
and my sacred books and in my journals, and that's it, right,
(27:44):
that's it. And we get it in the car and
I drive to friends of mine who live in Venice,
who so generously open their home. Does I'm just in
awe of them and the way they treated us and
the way they helped us. And you know, as a parent,
(28:07):
you can't really show fear. You want your children to
be calm, but you have feelings. And so I let
myself cried, didn't let myself get hysterical, but I let
myself cry, and I tried to explain as best I could,
and we made it to our friends and they just
held us, you know. They both took my son and
played with him. He stayed up the latest night he's
(28:28):
ever been awake, which was like midnight, and he stayed
awake and drew and made music with the heaven, laughed
and made art and cuddled. And I got to sit
upstairs just in front of the TV, watching waiting on
the floor and prayer and tears and in meditation, waiting
(28:50):
to see what would happen. And so a few days later,
I decided to get my son. My son remained in safety,
and I got him to a safe place, and then
I decided to come home because I felt that I
wanted to fight for my house, whatever that meant. And
I watched YouTube videos about how to turn on the
(29:12):
irrigation and how to turn off the gas, and I
got my annoying noil out and my prayers, and I
walked all the perimeters of every window and every door
and every wall and annoyed at it and prayed over it,
and went outside on my street and prayed. And you know,
I had this experience of the fear and the smells,
(29:34):
and you know, the booming in your chest and the anxiety.
But I also felt like, my kid is safe, our
important documents are safe, and I can run. You know,
I got wheels. So I felt that if I needed
to run down the hill and get to safety, I
could make it. And there was no place I wanted
(29:56):
to be more than here. And so every day and
it became safe for my son to come back home,
I would be in my house in silence, and I
checked the watch Duty app and I would meditate and
pray and play selection and kind of commune with God,
and I felt deep peace in that, and I felt
safety in that gratefully, and I was safe, gratefully. And
(30:22):
then you also notice not just the beauty of humanity.
Like watching first, I also have to say, I'm so
grateful for every person that reached out to me. There
are no words, there are no words, there are no words.
I got thousands of dms that I still have not
been able to open all of them. But I will
(30:42):
and I will respond to each one of them. That
is my promise. And I'm so grateful. So many calls,
so many calls, so many text messages. Some of my
friends were just really true warriors for me and were like, yo,
I can get a truck or you all right now
and get to your house with you. We can pack
it up, we can do whatever you need. I remember
(31:05):
I told one of my very close homeboys like he
was like, do you have that thang thing? And I
was like, yep, I got it. I lived in Texas,
so I know how to shoot. I used to go
to the shooting range all the time for many, many, many,
many many years, and I pray to God it's not
anything I ever have to do, but I do know how.
(31:28):
And so I was like, no, I feel protected. So
you're noticing the best in humanity, and I'm seeing all
of the aid coming to the city and all of
the care and all of the concern and the power
and the protection and the tenderness, and then you're also
seeing the despicable nature of humans as well. One of
(31:51):
the things that was experienced on my street because aside
from me and one other neighbor two houses down, my
whole street was empty. Everyone left, and looters hit the street.
I remember seeing what felt like someone casing a house
the night before, pretending to walk a dog but wearing
(32:13):
army fatigues. And I know everybody on the street, and
it's a very kind of strange street that I live
on that's not really walkable, so most people don't typically
walk on this street.
Speaker 4 (32:26):
And so.
Speaker 2 (32:28):
We then got an alert, and it was seen on
cameras in my neighborhood that men with ski masks and
unmarked white vans hit my street. And we got an
immediate response from the police, from undercover police and from
the National Guard who came and protected this street and
stood watch and stayed at all the corners. And I'm
(32:50):
so grateful for them, and I felt so safe because
of that. But even watching that and feeling that energy,
it's just, you know, the kind of person that could
and would do that is also the kind of person
that couldn't would do anything to anyone for any reason,
and so just the deceptive, evil energy of that in
(33:11):
and of itself is just so striking to encounter and
to feel. One of the things that was really ringing
true for me as we were packing up and leaving
was I was kind of getting this instant filing of
(33:32):
so many of my experiences come into my mind and
into my heart, and that was around all the different
things I've witnessed in this city, because we have had
a lot of devastation in a lot of different kinds
of ways. But I remembered one of my very first,
earliest core memories of being alive. I was right around
(33:54):
five years old, and at the time my mom and
I were living in Watts my family came to California.
I believe it was I could be wrong, but I
believe it was right around the twenties and they came.
Half of my family came from Oklahoma, that is where
the majority of my ancestors were from, and they came
(34:20):
from Oklahoma, and they bought homes in Watts And this
is before the White Flight happened, and so my early
life was living in one of my family in the
back house of one of my family's houses in Watts,
right around ninety eighth and Central. And one of my
(34:42):
first core memories is being five and feeling fear in
my body because the Rodney King riots had broke out
and I saw fire everywhere, and I didn't know what
that meant, right, I didn't know that La was bigger
than my area, so it seemed like the world was
on fire. And I remembered the sounds of looting. I
(35:02):
remember the breaking of glass. I remember seeing the glow
of orange through my window and kind of shooting shadows
onto the walls. I remember being confused as to why
we didn't have anywhere else to go and why we
were in that and confused. You know, a couple weeks later,
(35:24):
when you're walking around the neighborhood and everything is burned down.
The place that I went to get fried catfish burned down,
and you know, the the stores and the liquor stores
and all the things that are in your community burned down.
(35:45):
And I remember being so scared for my mom, who
worked in downtown LA, because I was like, is everywhere
going to be on fire? And and you know, to
this day those communities have not been adequately rebuilt. And
this was ninety one, it is the year twenty twenty five.
So on one hand, you understand what it is to
(36:06):
see a community burned down and it never be rebuilt
or never be rebuilt well, and money never really be
put back into it again ever, right, and what that
means generationally, Like we've now been able to observe that
what it is for an entire area to really burn
(36:27):
and to not be supported in generational homes to not
be rebuilt, and businesses to never be rebuilt or recover,
and to just kind of continue on a path of hardship.
It's one of the hardest communities still to this day
to live in. And the people there are still some
of the most resilient people that have ever lived, with
(36:50):
so much creativity and so many stories to tell. So
I was remembering that and those feelings and that first
kind of understanding of destruction, and then I remembered in
nineteen ninety four. Now, at this point in ninety four,
we were living in a different area that was night
and day to the area I had come from. And
(37:11):
that's when we were living in the primarily Mandarin speaking community.
And the Northridge earthquake hit, which was devastating, devastating to
so much of LA and it also hit so much
of LA that had a different socioeconomic status, and so
(37:34):
I remember, like cal State Northridge crumbled, the University Northridge crumbled,
so many buildings and offices crumbled to the ground. I
remember the four or five Freeway, which is a vast freeway,
one of the most important routes of transport here in
Los Angeles. I'm the Greater Los Angeles area. I remember
(37:58):
the freeway collapsed and a part of the overpass of
the four or five literally split in half. I remember
my aunt had a family back east in or friends
back east in Baltimore, and they asked us to mail
them chunks from the freeway, and they took it to
show and tell at their school, you know, And I
(38:19):
remember after that, you know, it took a lot to rebuild,
and there was a lot of devastation, but it did
get rebuilt, and it got rebuilt well, and it also
brought different levels of long term better systems being in
place to fight one of the things that does regularly
happen here, which is earthquakes. So a lot of the
(38:42):
buildings that had been here legally now have to be
up to code by being retrofit so they can't just
fall apart and crumble. It changed some of the codes
throughout the city planning, city building. It created different process
for how we evacuate or how we get through something.
Different programs even in our schools for what to do
(39:03):
if an earthquake hit. There were, you know, now constant
we had commercials on TV and my childhood after that
about what to do if an earthquake happened. There was
a song.
Speaker 5 (39:14):
That went along with it, so you knew, you know,
to stand under a door frame or get under a table,
or you know, all these things that are very much
ingrained in the LA experience now.
Speaker 2 (39:27):
So I was just kind of noticing two of the
ways that I've observed kind of more mass devastation in
this city through natural disaster or through elemental disaster, and
also how different the response to each was. And I
kind of conclude that storytelling was saying, I'm still thinking
(39:50):
about all of that. Right, we don't know, but I'm
observing it, I'm aware of it, and I know mentally
it's serving purpose and the way that I feel that
I can show up in this city long term, and
I think more than ever, I am committed to really
even more deeply planting in this city. Being a part
(40:10):
of the community of Los Angeles has always meant the
world to me. At times when I was younger and
didn't have the demands of my business and parenting and
all those things, I was very entrenched and constant giving
here and in volunteering, and that is something that I
realize now I cannot live without. And it is my
(40:32):
intention to spend a lot more time in service in
this city forever. I love this city. I'm grateful to
be from here. I'm grateful to live here now. And
my heart is broken for everyone that is broken and hurting.
One thing I know for certain, and I know this
(40:52):
doesn't always feel useful until we get some of the
initial shock and done and reaction and the initial waves
of grief out. But God will provide. God will provide.
God will provide. God always provides. God always provides. God
(41:16):
always provides. This is not a time to lecture anyone
who has gone through this about stuff being stuff. If
I see that or hear that from anyone, it's just
like disgusting. That's for your Anyone that says that that
is for your personal discomfort and it does not offer
(41:38):
any help. And especially if it's not a lesson you
actually know personally or have metabolized, don't say that to anybody.
It's stupid and it's selfish, and it causes more harm.
I think the best if anybody wants to know how
to help, I think really individual donation could be so helpful.
(42:02):
Sometimes people make mass donations to the Red Cross, but
when you donate to the Red Cross, that doesn't necessarily
go to a specific need. It goes to the Red Cross,
and then the Red Cross chooses how to disperse those
funds all over the country based on you know how
they give. So right now, I would say I've been
(42:26):
really more so connecting on go fundme and looking for
the pages that have only reached thirty percent of their
donation goals. If you see that someone has reached a goal,
it's not to say don't give, because people absolutely typically
need far more than their even requesting, but look for
the people, look for the places that have not yet
(42:47):
met that goal. You know, look for the people that
maybe because if their background or their family support or
the types of jobs that they work, may not have
long term help to re establish in their lives. They
may not, you know, have insurance of any kind, health insurance,
home insurance, They may not have first last, all these
(43:10):
things to get into a new place. One of the
stories I was watching.
Speaker 4 (43:14):
In the news that really got to me it was
this mom of a young baby, and she's a single mom,
and she's working a job that doesn't give her benefits,
and she just had this little baby who wasn't even
one yet, and they lost absolutely everything, and she doesn't
(43:37):
know how to rebuild long term, and how much it
took to probably even get what needs they had accomplished
before this fire. You know, look for some of the
people that may not even be social media savvy to
be able to set up these pages, or don't have
community rallying behind them to bring light or attention to
what they're going through. But whatever ways you feel called
(44:00):
to serve, I just want you to know, especially if
you're not in this city, we are grateful. We are
so grateful. We're so grateful for your care. We're so
grateful for your concern. We are grateful for your thoughts
and prayers. This is a time where I can say, honestly,
thoughts and prayers have meant everything to me. I felt
prayer enter my home from the people that said they
(44:21):
were praying for me. I felt prayers entering my body,
and I'm so grateful. So again I shared at the
top of this episode, this is a reflection episode. I
don't have solutions, I don't have a way to make
anyone feel better, but I will say I am present,
I am bearing witness to all of it. I am
here to serve and God will provide. This is one
(44:43):
of the most resilient, creative, compassionate cities in the world,
in the world, And if you don't understand how Ala works,
that is okay, but put some humility on it, some
respect on our name, because this city is one of
(45:03):
the most incredible, special, rare, synchronistic places on earth. That
is just a fact. And the people that are from
here have survived so much already. The majority of Los
Angeles is not Hollywood. It is not rich people. It
is not you know this kind of like privileged life.
Speaker 2 (45:28):
It is a place that you have to earn its respect,
and you've got to work your ass off to live here,
and it can take a lot from you and it
can give so much to you. So I think, in closing,
just thank you for sharing this space with me. My
heart is so grateful for every person that reached out.
(45:48):
My son and I are safe, we are back home.
The the evacuation orders in my close proximity as of today,
which is Thursday, January sixteenth, they have not been lifted yet,
but the fire has stayed on the ridge and it's
(46:10):
stayed where it's at, and I feel safe. We are safe,
We are home. We are getting back into our routine.
We are calming down, and we are finding all the
ways that we can best serve and show up for
the incredible people of this beautiful city and for all
those that are suffering and broken and confused. I love you,
(46:34):
I love you. I love you. God will provide, God
will make you hold. God will heal this. God bless you, God,
bless you, God, bless you, God bless us. And so
it is. Thank you for listening, and we will We'll
keep going. Big love, big love, big love, Thank you.
(46:57):
I must stay. The content presented on Deeply Well serves
solely for educational and informational purposes. It should not be
considered a replacement for personalized medical or mental health guidance,
and does not constitute a provider patient relationship. As always,
(47:17):
it is advisable to consult with your healthcare provider or
health team for any specific concerns or questions that you
may have. Connect with me on social at Debbie Brown.
That's Twitter and Instagram, or you can go to my
website Debbie Brown dot com. And if you're listening to
the show on Apple Podcasts, don't forget, Please rate, review,
(47:39):
and subscribe and send this episode to a friend. Deeply
Well is a production of iHeartRadio and The Black Effect Network.
It's produced by Jacquess Thomas, Samantha Timmins, and me Debbie Brown.
The Beautiful Soundbath You Heard That's by Jarrelen Glass from
Crystal Cadence. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio
(48:01):
app or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Take a deep breath in through your nose.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Holds it.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Now, release slowly again, deep in, helle hold release, repeating
(01:02):
internally to yourself as you connect to my voice.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
I am deeply well. I am deeply deep well. I
am deeply.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
Wow well.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
I'm Debbie Brown and this is the Deeply Well Podcast.
Welcome to Deeply Well, a soft place to land on
your journey. A podcast for those that are curious, creative,
and ready to expand in higher consciousness and self care.
(01:53):
This is where we heal, this is where we transcend.
Welcome back to another episode. I'm Debbie Brown. Of course
this is Deeply Well, and my goodness, this episode is
a little bit different. I'm actually sitting in my kitchen
recording this episode, staring out the window as we have
(02:18):
had one of the toughest times in Los Angeles in
recent history. This episode, I'm going to be talking about
the LA fires, and I think my approach to this
episode is I want to share with you my experience
and some of the ways that I've been looking at
(02:40):
this experience. This is not necessarily an episode that is
going to be super supportive in terms of resources. I
do feel that there is some incredible information out there
that is easily accessible. So I don't know if it
would be the best use of our connection or if
that's how I can best service to share things that
(03:03):
I know are really adequately getting around. It's been profound
and incredible to see the response of aid in the
world and in the community, and especially on Instagram. It
feels like there are so many well vetted services and
charities and ways to connect with different demographics of people
(03:25):
that have been displaced or harmed or broken by this
tragedy and by this natural disaster. And so I trust
that those resources are available for those that are looking
for a way to serve and to help in this moment.
I found the resources to be incredible for myself. One
(03:48):
of my focuses that ways I'm looking to really serve
is to help single moms that have been displaced by
this buyer, who have lost things or need help in
this moment. So that is an area actively looking to
serve children and looking to serve single parents and just
looking to serve. So I am right along there with everyone,
(04:09):
and I've been really grateful my dear friend DJ Head,
who's been a friend of mine for nearly twenty years.
In the La area. His page at djhad is where
I've been finding a lot of amazing resources and opportunities
to get in touch with people and to serve. LAist
is another site that I've been looking at a lot,
(04:31):
and of course, you know some of the bigger ones.
I found that KTLA five is giving a lot of
reporting and coverage that feels really useful to me. So
I hope that everyone is doing what they can. And
if you felt called to help us here in this city,
I hope you're connected to the resource that feels most appropriate,
(04:51):
most authentic, and most deeply connected to the way that
you can show up in service and in your gifts.
This episode, I kind of to talk about what it
is to feel your way through an experience like this
and a natural disaster. So I want to share a
little bit about my love for this beautiful, beautiful city.
(05:17):
If you've listened to this podcast, and especially if you
have connected with my work prior to the last decade,
something that used to always be in my Twitter and
Instagram bio it used to also be in my regular
bio is that I always would put down that I'm
a West Coast enthusiast, and it's something that actually Charlemagne
(05:41):
speaks to a lot about me. It's a big part
about our early relationship is I used to be the
quintessential La girl, LA sweetheart, running around in Chuck Taylor's
with the West Coast dub on my hand, at all
the LAS shows and concerts, and deeply in the community
(06:02):
of Los Angeles. When I had the opportunity to be
the director of community service at the radio station I
used to work at, we would create things within the
city and within the inner city, summer programs and concert series,
and I know every inch of this city and it's
something that I'm very, very very very proud of. I
(06:25):
have always considered LA to be my soulmate and something
that I think gets misunderstood about LA, especially if you're
a transplant or if you just look at LA from
the outside looking in. You know, the thing about people
that are born and raised in LA, and I have
always felt exceptionally proud, honored and lucky to be born
(06:49):
and raised in LA, is that we don't see Los
Angeles through the lens that the outside world does. We're
not looking at LA is opportunity, and Los Angeles has
roughly around eighteen million people in it, the population is massive.
We are one of the biggest economies in the world.
(07:09):
I think we're the fifth biggest economy in the entire globe.
Our weather is representative of only one percent of the world.
So certain things about it do make it naturally just
truthfully a very rare experience, which is not to say
it's better than anywhere else that anybody is from. I
(07:32):
think God places us exactly where we are, and every
place has its power and its beauty and its specialness.
But to be born and raised in La and to
be awake to the contrast that is LA is something
that is so different. And my relationship with this city,
I've always referred to the city itself as my soulmate.
(07:52):
And even when I had chances to have a successful,
beautiful life and other great cities like Manhattan, Brookland, and
I lived in both of those for years. When I
had the opportunity to live in Houston, Texas. These are
cities that are rich in culture and beauty and incredible,
but there was never a time I didn't long to
(08:13):
be home. And I think for so many of us
that are born and raised in La, again, we don't
look at this city as opportunity. We don't look at
this city as someplace we move to, you know, maybe
rise or be creative or you know, live our dreams.
It's just our city. It's just where we're from, you know.
And so we know it. We don't really congregate in
(08:37):
the areas that you see on TV. We don't really
you know, choose to live in Hollywood, or choose to
live in West Hollywood even or choose to live in
downtown LA. Like, we understand the vastness and the profound
diversity that is in this city. And when people come
here and they say they don't like it or they
don't understand it, it's a city that requires something of you,
(09:00):
you know, and it's a city that in some ways
you have to earn its respect. It's not just about
what you can come here and take, or the way
that this city is amplifies one owns ego or optics
or ability to earn or succeed. It's a city that
is incredibly resilient, that is living polarity in every second.
(09:24):
And so whenever people are transplants here and they complain
about the city, it really, to me always highlights just
a bigger insecurity or time not spent enough creating a
life here. A lot of people move here to create career,
to create content, to create a perception that they want
(09:46):
the people in the world or in the cities that
they're from to have about them. But this city is
its own, and you know, just like the saying for
New Yorkers, very similar in how protective we are of
where we're from to those that are or native New Yorkers.
But if you can make it here, you can make
it anywhere. But the idea that you can come to
(10:06):
La and it all makes sense at once is silly.
It's a city of nearly twenty million people that is
spread out for miles and miles and miles, with every
single crevice representing something different and being different. It is
a true melting pot where our diversity is vast and
(10:30):
it's interconnected, and we all have a deep respect for
one another and for the cultures that make this city
this city. I thought Kendrick's last album was one of
the most beautiful, beautiful dedications to a place so special.
It wove the culture together and it also showed the resilience.
(10:53):
And I talked about this a lot in the episode
I did about integrity The Art of Integrity, where discussed
Kendrick's incredible career in his connection to the city, and
LA is something else entirely, and it is not Hollywood.
Hollywood is the place of transplants, in the place of projection.
(11:15):
It's really not DTLA.
Speaker 4 (11:17):
You know.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
When I was growing up, my mom for over twenty
years worked at a law firm in downtown LA. So
as a latchkey kid, as an only child to a
single parent, Downtown LA was a huge part of my childhood,
to the point where, if I'm being honest, I really
can't stand to go to it now because I don't
really recognize it. It feels like Downtown LA has been
(11:40):
trying by people that are not from LA to be
transformed into New York. But it's not and it's not
what it was ever designed to be. When I was
growing up, my mom would work extra shifts and do
overtime in downtown LA, and I remember by six pm
it was a literal goal because people didn't live there.
(12:02):
That's where the primary housing for unhoused people was found,
and a part of the city that some may have
heard of that was referred to as skid row. It
was a tough place to be. But it was also
all commerce, and so when we'd go there on the weekends,
we'd have to pack a lunch because no businesses were open,
(12:23):
no restaurants were open. The cities. You know, it looked
like there should have been a huge like dust ball
going through it. It was that empty all the time
in non nine to five hours. I had the chance
growing up to see and understand this city in a really,
really unique way. We moved all over all the time,
(12:48):
and it gave me such a beautiful look at what
the truth and the heart of this city is. For
parts of my childhood, I lived deeply within South Central
and that was I was born in the mid eighties,
and so that was living in a city right after
(13:09):
in a part of the city that was ravaged by crack,
that was ravaged by police brutality, that was ravaged ravaged
by gangs, by death, by drug addiction, it was ravaged
by incarceration. It's an area of the city that so
(13:30):
many men were ripped out of homes. There were so
so much governmental inequity and systemic oppression and planned and
executed oppression from all over from the government, from so
(13:52):
many different systems within the city. It's a place that
has taken a brutal beating since the White Flight had,
you know, towards the fifties and the sixties, and it's
a place that's been ravaged. And some of the way
God has directed and ordered my life is that I
am always keenly, keenly aware of contrast. I am always
(14:15):
keenly aware of polarity and duality. And so for someone
who is a double Gemini, whose part of my life's
journey is about serving humanity and recognizing the contrast of humanity,
Los Angeles was often a feast for my senses as
(14:37):
a child. I remember in these long commutes my mom
and I would have. I remember driving through all the
parts of the city and understanding it on a soul level.
When you drive through Rodeo Drive and you see what
life looks like there, or you're driving through Manhattan Beach
or Venice, and then thirty minutes later you're also driving
(15:00):
through or you're driving through Larchmont Village or Hancock Park,
and then you make it to your stop in South Central.
You see the differences, right. You see you're exposed to
potential and possibility, but you also see profound and fairness,
(15:20):
and you see that some people, you know, experience life
quite differently from others. So that's something I've always watched
and studied and one of the things that I find
so deep and beautiful about this city. So for part
of my young life, that was my home. For part
(15:41):
of my young life, I also lived in parts of
the cities that were almost one hundred percent Mandarin speaking.
I remember for a portion of my life I lived
in an area called Alhambra, which was most of the
businesses there are Chinese owned and operated, and the language
really revolves around that. So that was a cultural feast
(16:03):
for me in understanding and in exposures, and also experiencing
some alienation because when you come and you're one of
the only people a handful of people that look like
you and your school or in those parts of the city,
and the cultural identity is so strong, there's not really
a lot of crossing the lines. That's what it felt like.
(16:27):
And for other parts of my life, I was in
parts of the city that were primarily exclusively Spanish speaking
and were representative of first generation immigrating from Mexico and
the families building their lives and their businesses and their
futures in those spaces and being able to be witnessed too,
(16:50):
and not necessarily always a part of but witness too.
Very strong, beautiful cultural identity, and in other parts of
my life, you know, I was very connected and always
in Santa Monica, Hancock Park, Larchmont Village. It's where I
went to preschool, was in Larchmont, So I've been around
(17:11):
a lot. Of My family also lived in the South
Bay and in Long Beach, and in San Pedro, and
in Carson and Harbor City, and all these areas that
are night and day from each other. Aside from the
strength and community, but it's always made me feel safe.
There is not a part of the city that I
don't go to that I don't feel safe or comfortable in,
(17:33):
that I don't understand people in and recognize people in.
I moved through all of Greater Los Angeles regularly with
constant ease and grace. It's a city that I was
born in. I was born in Hollywood, a city I
went to college and went to a cal State school here,
went to school at every step of the way, and
(17:55):
it's a city I was blessed to start my career
in before my journey in my mid and late twenties
brought me to a couple other major cities. So to
say that I know this city would be an understatement.
To say that I love this city would be an understatement.
To say that I respect and revere this city and
(18:16):
the people in it would be an understatement. So this
week has been so hard to see so many people
struggling to see the duality and the contrast that is
present even in the areas that have burned, and the
differences of what that might mean to those varying groups
(18:39):
of people from varying economic statuses, and the heartbreak no
matter what your background or economic status is, and the
devastation no matter what and what this means and does
it mean for the potential and possibility of the people affected,
and how they're able or not to move forward generationally
(19:03):
long term. I live in a part of the city
that is called Encino, and I love this area. When
it was time for me to move back to La
God sent it to me in a dream. I had
never really spent time here. It was an area I think,
and this is so funny, and I haven't shared this
(19:24):
story with him even but I remember when I was
sixteen a girlfriend had her birthday party. I think it
was her birthday, her graduation party at the only creole
restaurant in Greater LA. And it was in Encino. And
I remember, keep in mind, when I was in high school,
(19:46):
the Lakers and they still are, but they were life.
So we went to the finals every single year I
was in high school and freshman, sophomore in junior years,
that's when we had our three pet and we won
the championship. It was Shaq, it was Kobe rest in peace,
and it was just such a special time to be
(20:08):
young in this city. And I remember so Lakers were gods,
that they were kings and it was just like and
Dodgers too. It was just such a huge part of
my life in childhood. The Dodgers are my favorite sports
team of all time and baseball is my favorite sport
of all time to watch and to go to games
of one hundred percent because as a child, my mom,
(20:31):
through her job, used to get tickets to go to
Dodger Stadium and to see the Dodgers play. So the
fibers of La run so deep in my soul. But
where was I I remember in Encinel my girlfriend had
(20:51):
her dinner at this place that was called Stevie's Creole
Restaurant doesn't exist anymore, but it was a big deal
in the time, and it was kind of upscale and different.
And I remember we came and outside of Stevie's I
got to meet Derek Fisher for the very first time,
and I remember we were so excited. We're like the
licerus are here. But that memory came coming back. But
(21:16):
so I didn't know really anything about this part of
the city. But when I was thinking about moving back
to La I had a dream about it. And that's
how a lot comes to me. I had a dream
about my son's name seven years before I was pregnant,
and that's how I knew what to name him. And
I very often get dreams about things that I should do,
or places I should invest or places I should live.
(21:39):
So I've had them so often throughout my life that
I trust them immediately. And so when God gave me
that vision, it was like, you will live in and
see you know. I was like, Okay, I don't know
where that is. I don't know who lives there, you know,
but okay, and I found what for me is this
little chunk of heaven and Paradise, and the first few
(22:03):
days of the fire, I was driving into Santa Monica
when the fire broke out, and I just saw these
huge clouds of smoke instantaneously filled the city and I
was like, oh my god, I have to get home now. Initially,
when we have wildfires here, it is something that, especially
if you were born and raised to some extent, is
(22:25):
a regular occurrence. We have what is known as like
a wildfire season in LA And I've been back in
La living full time for the last eight years, and
at least four of those years we have had massive
fires in Malibu, even over by the Getty Center. And
typically my area is affected by both of those because
we're not that far from Malibu, very close to the
(22:48):
Getty Center, and so we would get all the smoke
and all the ash. This was something different entirely. You know.
I had been watching for a couple of days the
fire in Pacific Palace, sayed the fire in Altadena, and
then the fire made it to me, and it's terrifying.
(23:09):
I had a lot of peace in my heart because
I trust God, and my life has been destroyed a
few times, so I also trust my adaptability and my
resilience and God's favor and protection and rebuilding. I know,
nothing on this earth is permanent, but of course you
start to feel and experience the depth of sadness throughout
(23:34):
the city.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
And for all those.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
That are empaths living here and even watching from afar,
you know just what that means. You feel it in
the core of your body. And if you are connected
to this city, especially in a deep way, if you
have been in service to this city, if you study
this city, if you really love and appreciate this city,
it hits you in a way that is just profoundly painful.
(24:00):
And so the fire made it to me last week
and some of the experience that I was having was
I'm a single mom. My son is six and a half.
Is you realize all that you can't do, you know,
when it's in your back door and you're being told
to evacuate, And right where I live. It was by
kind of near the Encino Reservoir, which, thank God, is this,
(24:23):
you know, reservoir of water that a lot of these
incredible firefighters, My god, think you think you think you
thank you, Thank you to these incredible firefighters. Thank you
to the firefighters who firefighting is your life's work. Thank
you to the firefighters who are incarcerated men and women
who have been sacrificing endlessly. Thank you to the police,
(24:46):
thank you, thank you God to the police. Thank you
to our city, our first responders. There's just not enough
words to offer the thanks and the reverence, the gratitude,
the awe that we have for each one of you.
I'm so grateful for your lives. I'm so grateful for
your sacrifice, so grateful for your care, for your concern,
(25:09):
for your power, for your protection.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Deeply well well, and.
Speaker 2 (25:29):
When that happens, you know, when that happened here, you
realize what you can't do, and you realize.
Speaker 4 (25:33):
It could all go.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
And you know, my home is truly a sanctuary. And
it's not something I really share on social media because
it's mine, you know, it's my sacred space, it's my
family's sacred space. It's something that I hold private because
it means a lot, not just to me, but to
the people that are here that spend time here. I
(25:56):
take clients here, my friends and family, and I have
big parties at my house or big cookoffs at my house.
It's a place that is always filled with romance, with moodiness,
with music, with love, with life, with laughter, and so
as I'm watching the news and I'm seeing that it
(26:19):
is here now in my backyard, and it sounds like
war outside because again I'm right by the reservoirs. So
all the helicopters and all the planes are going non stop,
and you're just hearing that, right, You're hearing the choppers.
You're hearing these huge, like miraculous vessels fill with water
(26:40):
and dump water. And yeah, it's something I experience a
lot of life, and my memories are really rooted in
how the nature around me feels as I'm having whatever
experience I'm having, and so things like that really stay
with me on a very deep level. And I'm looking around.
(27:01):
I looked down at my hands and it's me and
my son, and I'm like, I have a bad back
in two hands, I can't save anything. You know. It
just really you think there is a way to pick
and choose what's important to you, and there really isn't
you know. I managed, you know, gratefully. I packed meaningful
things for my son because his life just started, so
(27:22):
that matters more than anything. And then I have a
collection of Tupac signatures that I got that, and you know,
all our important documents and my camera and my computer
and my sacred books and in my journals, and that's it, right,
(27:44):
that's it. And we get it in the car and
I drive to friends of mine who live in Venice,
who so generously open their home. Does I'm just in
awe of them and the way they treated us and
the way they helped us. And you know, as a parent,
(28:07):
you can't really show fear. You want your children to
be calm, but you have feelings. And so I let
myself cried, didn't let myself get hysterical, but I let
myself cry, and I tried to explain as best I could,
and we made it to our friends and they just
held us, you know. They both took my son and
played with him. He stayed up the latest night he's
(28:28):
ever been awake, which was like midnight, and he stayed
awake and drew and made music with the heaven, laughed
and made art and cuddled. And I got to sit
upstairs just in front of the TV, watching waiting on
the floor and prayer and tears and in meditation, waiting
(28:50):
to see what would happen. And so a few days later,
I decided to get my son. My son remained in safety,
and I got him to a safe place, and then
I decided to come home because I felt that I
wanted to fight for my house, whatever that meant. And
I watched YouTube videos about how to turn on the
(29:12):
irrigation and how to turn off the gas, and I
got my annoying noil out and my prayers, and I
walked all the perimeters of every window and every door
and every wall and annoyed at it and prayed over it,
and went outside on my street and prayed. And you know,
I had this experience of the fear and the smells,
(29:34):
and you know, the booming in your chest and the anxiety.
But I also felt like, my kid is safe, our
important documents are safe, and I can run. You know,
I got wheels. So I felt that if I needed
to run down the hill and get to safety, I
could make it. And there was no place I wanted
(29:56):
to be more than here. And so every day and
it became safe for my son to come back home,
I would be in my house in silence, and I
checked the watch Duty app and I would meditate and
pray and play selection and kind of commune with God,
and I felt deep peace in that, and I felt
safety in that gratefully, and I was safe, gratefully. And
(30:22):
then you also notice not just the beauty of humanity.
Like watching first, I also have to say, I'm so
grateful for every person that reached out to me. There
are no words, there are no words, there are no words.
I got thousands of dms that I still have not
been able to open all of them. But I will
(30:42):
and I will respond to each one of them. That
is my promise. And I'm so grateful. So many calls,
so many calls, so many text messages. Some of my
friends were just really true warriors for me and were like, yo,
I can get a truck or you all right now
and get to your house with you. We can pack
it up, we can do whatever you need. I remember
(31:05):
I told one of my very close homeboys like he
was like, do you have that thang thing? And I
was like, yep, I got it. I lived in Texas,
so I know how to shoot. I used to go
to the shooting range all the time for many, many, many,
many many years, and I pray to God it's not
anything I ever have to do, but I do know how.
(31:28):
And so I was like, no, I feel protected. So
you're noticing the best in humanity, and I'm seeing all
of the aid coming to the city and all of
the care and all of the concern and the power
and the protection and the tenderness, and then you're also
seeing the despicable nature of humans as well. One of
(31:51):
the things that was experienced on my street because aside
from me and one other neighbor two houses down, my
whole street was empty. Everyone left, and looters hit the street.
I remember seeing what felt like someone casing a house
the night before, pretending to walk a dog but wearing
(32:13):
army fatigues. And I know everybody on the street, and
it's a very kind of strange street that I live
on that's not really walkable, so most people don't typically
walk on this street.
Speaker 4 (32:26):
And so.
Speaker 2 (32:28):
We then got an alert, and it was seen on
cameras in my neighborhood that men with ski masks and
unmarked white vans hit my street. And we got an
immediate response from the police, from undercover police and from
the National Guard who came and protected this street and
stood watch and stayed at all the corners. And I'm
(32:50):
so grateful for them, and I felt so safe because
of that. But even watching that and feeling that energy,
it's just, you know, the kind of person that could
and would do that is also the kind of person
that couldn't would do anything to anyone for any reason,
and so just the deceptive, evil energy of that in
(33:11):
and of itself is just so striking to encounter and
to feel. One of the things that was really ringing
true for me as we were packing up and leaving
was I was kind of getting this instant filing of
(33:32):
so many of my experiences come into my mind and
into my heart, and that was around all the different
things I've witnessed in this city, because we have had
a lot of devastation in a lot of different kinds
of ways. But I remembered one of my very first,
earliest core memories of being alive. I was right around
(33:54):
five years old, and at the time my mom and
I were living in Watts my family came to California.
I believe it was I could be wrong, but I
believe it was right around the twenties and they came.
Half of my family came from Oklahoma, that is where
the majority of my ancestors were from, and they came
(34:20):
from Oklahoma, and they bought homes in Watts And this
is before the White Flight happened, and so my early
life was living in one of my family in the
back house of one of my family's houses in Watts,
right around ninety eighth and Central. And one of my
(34:42):
first core memories is being five and feeling fear in
my body because the Rodney King riots had broke out
and I saw fire everywhere, and I didn't know what
that meant, right, I didn't know that La was bigger
than my area, so it seemed like the world was
on fire. And I remembered the sounds of looting. I
(35:02):
remember the breaking of glass. I remember seeing the glow
of orange through my window and kind of shooting shadows
onto the walls. I remember being confused as to why
we didn't have anywhere else to go and why we
were in that and confused. You know, a couple weeks later,
(35:24):
when you're walking around the neighborhood and everything is burned down.
The place that I went to get fried catfish burned down,
and you know, the the stores and the liquor stores
and all the things that are in your community burned down.
(35:45):
And I remember being so scared for my mom, who
worked in downtown LA, because I was like, is everywhere
going to be on fire? And and you know, to
this day those communities have not been adequately rebuilt. And
this was ninety one, it is the year twenty twenty five.
So on one hand, you understand what it is to
(36:06):
see a community burned down and it never be rebuilt
or never be rebuilt well, and money never really be
put back into it again ever, right, and what that
means generationally, Like we've now been able to observe that
what it is for an entire area to really burn
(36:27):
and to not be supported in generational homes to not
be rebuilt, and businesses to never be rebuilt or recover,
and to just kind of continue on a path of hardship.
It's one of the hardest communities still to this day
to live in. And the people there are still some
of the most resilient people that have ever lived, with
(36:50):
so much creativity and so many stories to tell. So
I was remembering that and those feelings and that first
kind of understanding of destruction, and then I remembered in
nineteen ninety four. Now, at this point in ninety four,
we were living in a different area that was night
and day to the area I had come from. And
(37:11):
that's when we were living in the primarily Mandarin speaking community.
And the Northridge earthquake hit, which was devastating, devastating to
so much of LA and it also hit so much
of LA that had a different socioeconomic status, and so
(37:34):
I remember, like cal State Northridge crumbled, the University Northridge crumbled,
so many buildings and offices crumbled to the ground. I
remember the four or five Freeway, which is a vast freeway,
one of the most important routes of transport here in
Los Angeles. I'm the Greater Los Angeles area. I remember
(37:58):
the freeway collapsed and a part of the overpass of
the four or five literally split in half. I remember
my aunt had a family back east in or friends
back east in Baltimore, and they asked us to mail
them chunks from the freeway, and they took it to
show and tell at their school, you know, And I
(38:19):
remember after that, you know, it took a lot to rebuild,
and there was a lot of devastation, but it did
get rebuilt, and it got rebuilt well, and it also
brought different levels of long term better systems being in
place to fight one of the things that does regularly
happen here, which is earthquakes. So a lot of the
(38:42):
buildings that had been here legally now have to be
up to code by being retrofit so they can't just
fall apart and crumble. It changed some of the codes
throughout the city planning, city building. It created different process
for how we evacuate or how we get through something.
Different programs even in our schools for what to do
(39:03):
if an earthquake hit. There were, you know, now constant
we had commercials on TV and my childhood after that
about what to do if an earthquake happened. There was
a song.
Speaker 5 (39:14):
That went along with it, so you knew, you know,
to stand under a door frame or get under a table,
or you know, all these things that are very much
ingrained in the LA experience now.
Speaker 2 (39:27):
So I was just kind of noticing two of the
ways that I've observed kind of more mass devastation in
this city through natural disaster or through elemental disaster, and
also how different the response to each was. And I
kind of conclude that storytelling was saying, I'm still thinking
(39:50):
about all of that. Right, we don't know, but I'm
observing it, I'm aware of it, and I know mentally
it's serving purpose and the way that I feel that
I can show up in this city long term, and
I think more than ever, I am committed to really
even more deeply planting in this city. Being a part
(40:10):
of the community of Los Angeles has always meant the
world to me. At times when I was younger and
didn't have the demands of my business and parenting and
all those things, I was very entrenched and constant giving
here and in volunteering, and that is something that I
realize now I cannot live without. And it is my
(40:32):
intention to spend a lot more time in service in
this city forever. I love this city. I'm grateful to
be from here. I'm grateful to live here now. And
my heart is broken for everyone that is broken and hurting.
One thing I know for certain, and I know this
(40:52):
doesn't always feel useful until we get some of the
initial shock and done and reaction and the initial waves
of grief out. But God will provide. God will provide.
God will provide. God always provides. God always provides. God
(41:16):
always provides. This is not a time to lecture anyone
who has gone through this about stuff being stuff. If
I see that or hear that from anyone, it's just
like disgusting. That's for your Anyone that says that that
is for your personal discomfort and it does not offer
(41:38):
any help. And especially if it's not a lesson you
actually know personally or have metabolized, don't say that to anybody.
It's stupid and it's selfish, and it causes more harm.
I think the best if anybody wants to know how
to help, I think really individual donation could be so helpful.
(42:02):
Sometimes people make mass donations to the Red Cross, but
when you donate to the Red Cross, that doesn't necessarily
go to a specific need. It goes to the Red Cross,
and then the Red Cross chooses how to disperse those
funds all over the country based on you know how
they give. So right now, I would say I've been
(42:26):
really more so connecting on go fundme and looking for
the pages that have only reached thirty percent of their
donation goals. If you see that someone has reached a goal,
it's not to say don't give, because people absolutely typically
need far more than their even requesting, but look for
the people, look for the places that have not yet
(42:47):
met that goal. You know, look for the people that
maybe because if their background or their family support or
the types of jobs that they work, may not have
long term help to re establish in their lives. They
may not, you know, have insurance of any kind, health insurance,
home insurance, They may not have first last, all these
(43:10):
things to get into a new place. One of the
stories I was watching.
Speaker 4 (43:14):
In the news that really got to me it was
this mom of a young baby, and she's a single mom,
and she's working a job that doesn't give her benefits,
and she just had this little baby who wasn't even
one yet, and they lost absolutely everything, and she doesn't
(43:37):
know how to rebuild long term, and how much it
took to probably even get what needs they had accomplished
before this fire. You know, look for some of the
people that may not even be social media savvy to
be able to set up these pages, or don't have
community rallying behind them to bring light or attention to
what they're going through. But whatever ways you feel called
(44:00):
to serve, I just want you to know, especially if
you're not in this city, we are grateful. We are
so grateful. We're so grateful for your care. We're so
grateful for your concern. We are grateful for your thoughts
and prayers. This is a time where I can say, honestly,
thoughts and prayers have meant everything to me. I felt
prayer enter my home from the people that said they
(44:21):
were praying for me. I felt prayers entering my body,
and I'm so grateful. So again I shared at the
top of this episode, this is a reflection episode. I
don't have solutions, I don't have a way to make
anyone feel better, but I will say I am present,
I am bearing witness to all of it. I am
here to serve and God will provide. This is one
(44:43):
of the most resilient, creative, compassionate cities in the world,
in the world, And if you don't understand how Ala works,
that is okay, but put some humility on it, some
respect on our name, because this city is one of
(45:03):
the most incredible, special, rare, synchronistic places on earth. That
is just a fact. And the people that are from
here have survived so much already. The majority of Los
Angeles is not Hollywood. It is not rich people. It
is not you know this kind of like privileged life.
Speaker 2 (45:28):
It is a place that you have to earn its respect,
and you've got to work your ass off to live here,
and it can take a lot from you and it
can give so much to you. So I think, in closing,
just thank you for sharing this space with me. My
heart is so grateful for every person that reached out.
(45:48):
My son and I are safe, we are back home.
The the evacuation orders in my close proximity as of today,
which is Thursday, January sixteenth, they have not been lifted yet,
but the fire has stayed on the ridge and it's
(46:10):
stayed where it's at, and I feel safe. We are safe,
We are home. We are getting back into our routine.
We are calming down, and we are finding all the
ways that we can best serve and show up for
the incredible people of this beautiful city and for all
those that are suffering and broken and confused. I love you,
(46:34):
I love you. I love you. God will provide, God
will make you hold. God will heal this. God bless you, God,
bless you, God, bless you, God bless us. And so
it is. Thank you for listening, and we will We'll
keep going. Big love, big love, big love, Thank you.
(46:57):
I must stay. The content presented on Deeply Well serves
solely for educational and informational purposes. It should not be
considered a replacement for personalized medical or mental health guidance,
and does not constitute a provider patient relationship. As always,
(47:17):
it is advisable to consult with your healthcare provider or
health team for any specific concerns or questions that you
may have. Connect with me on social at Debbie Brown.
That's Twitter and Instagram, or you can go to my
website Debbie Brown dot com. And if you're listening to
the show on Apple Podcasts, don't forget, Please rate, review,
(47:39):
and subscribe and send this episode to a friend. Deeply
Well is a production of iHeartRadio and The Black Effect Network.
It's produced by Jacquess Thomas, Samantha Timmins, and me Debbie Brown.
The Beautiful Soundbath You Heard That's by Jarrelen Glass from
Crystal Cadence. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio
(48:01):
app or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Host
Devi Brown
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