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A Love Letter to a City on Fire

That’s the thing about fire. It consumes everything in its path. And that includes hate, political divisions and artificial city limit lines separating Angelenos.
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January 15, 2025
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My beloved city, a city of literal angels and refuge that accepted my family and me years ago after we escaped a brutal land seeking freedom and safety: You have been ravaged by fire, and my heart is ravaged, too. 

You provided shelter for many, and overnight, that shelter was reduced to rubble and ashes. The merciless fires even skipped across your roads on their way to wreak more havoc — roads, such as Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) that I have traveled as a means of respite from your crowded urban centers. Come to think of it, you continued to provide me with refuge and respite years after welcoming me here. 

For this former child refugee, the Pacific Ocean that flanks PCH on the west represented the ultimate freedom. I was driven out of the Middle East, but once I was safe within your city limits, tyranny ended with that ocean that lines one side of PCH. The tyrants couldn’t chase me into the sea. It didn’t work for Pharaoh, and it wouldn’t have worked for them. 

PCH represented freedom. And now, part of that freedom seems gone.

For many, one of the best parts of your Pacific Coast Highway was that it was free — literally. Growing up, my family and I couldn’t spend precious funds at the iconic restaurants or shops that dotted the road, but as long as we had our brown Oldsmobile and roughly $7 worth of gas, we were wealthy; our riches measured in the deep breaths of the salty sea air that we inhaled after rolling down the car windows and wondering just how far north we could drive with $7 in the gas tank. 

Those famous restaurants and shops took on a different meaning to those who were never able to afford stepping inside. Reel Inn restaurant always had the best signs with the wittiest puns. Just don’t ask us about the food. The fish there must have been very fresh, we thought each time we passed Reel Inn and ate our homemade tuna sandwiches in the car. “Did you see the sign outside?” we asked our parents. It read, “Here’s looking at you, squid.” One day, we would discover why that was a clever play on words. 

During our family drives on PCH, we looked out our window to the left for Gladstone’s. “That’s where the Americans drink alcohol at 4:30 in the afternoon,” my father would declare as he drove that Oldsmobile one-handed. Dining at Gladstone’s was a laughable thought (do you know how much canned tuna one can buy for $25?), but the beach was public property. I grew up on the beach at Gladstone’s, where the barrel of free peanuts made me and the seagulls I fed so very happy. 

An open beachside road and free peanuts. What else does one need to love L.A.?

On the right, there was Patrick’s Roadhouse. What was a roadhouse? No one knew. Perhaps that was where they replaced cars that broke down on the PCH. As for Moonshadows, it looked so romantic. Even the name was romantic, conjuring something forbidden for our traditional family. 

As we drove farther, we found the wonderful Malibu Feed Bin, whose chickens and ducks delighted us. Between the glamour we imagined inside Moonshadows and the dirt-beneath-your-feet appeal of the Feed Bin, PCH provided a wonderful contrast of quaint community and chic Americana.

Every place I have mentioned so far is now either gone or badly damaged. We cry for our city on a fiery hill. The apocalypse is being televised, and the refresh button torments us. 

I remember that one day, we drove by a new Chabad Jewish center on PCH, located conveniently next to a kosher joint named Fish Grill. We were elated to learn that we could spend a modest sum at Fish Grill, though my mother still insisted on bringing bagfuls of pita bread from home because “that place never gives you enough bread and it’s always the thin, round ones that smell like corn and soap.”

We watched fireworks on the Fourth of July across the road from Palisades Charter High School. The fireworks were exciting and vibrantly wonderful. Most importantly, they were free. To think that “Pali” was engulfed in flames is more than painful, it’s personal. 

My beloved city, this week, you have taught me a vital lesson: As I watched the massive black plumes of smoke completely overtake my neighborhood and the hazardous air conditions burn my eyes, I finally understood that in Los Angeles, we all live beneath the same sky. 

This week, we understood the fragility of our most important spaces. Overwhelmed neighbors in the Pacific Palisades helped each other with zero regard for politics or how one or the other voted. On social media, Angelenos offered everything from spare bedrooms to toys, clothes and even stalls for horses rescued from the fires, without any consideration of someone’s political affiliation. 

Pharmacies, such as the Jewish-owned Mickey Fine pharmacies, opened their doors for those who needed medication after their local pharmacies burned to the ground. L.A. plastic surgeons such as Dr. Ariel Ourian offered free and immediate surgical care for fire victims. Bystanders helped elderly residents escape homes surrounded by flames. Los Angeles firefighters and other first responders deserve their place among the city’s true heroes of the year. 

What can one say to the loved ones of over 20 people killed by the fires? Or to those who lost their homes and all their possessions overnight, or whose businesses are now rubble? I watched a video of a man who had just lost his home, but who dropped to his knees and sobbed in gratitude as firefighters placed his beloved rescued cat in his arms. 

In the Palisades, whole bluffs are gone. Everything from neighborhoods to large supermarkets to schools, car washes, gas stations, and libraries are no longer. To declare that the Pacific Palisades are gone is not an exaggeration. 

In Pasadena, a historic church and a nearly 100-year-old synagogue perished. Thankfully, the Torah scrolls from Chabad of Pacific Palisades were rescued, as were the ones from the Pasadena Jewish Temple and Center. The preschool at the center, however, didn’t make it. 

That’s the thing about fire. It consumes everything in its path. And that includes hate, political divisions and artificial city limit lines separating Angelenos. Fire destroys all that is good, but sometimes, it also annihilates that which is very bad. At least, temporarily. 

But because this is still Los Angeles, the fires also brought out some looters. I was not surprised. My City of Angels, I love you deeply, but you didn’t raise a fool. 

This has been a devastating week. Can you keep a secret, my dear city? Power outages, like the short ones I experienced this week from the unbelievable winds that spread the fires, are triggering for me. When I was a little girl in Iran, blackouts were a near-daily occurrence during the Iran-Iraq War. There were also mandatory “lights out” policies that Tehran enforced, hoping that Iraqi pilots would identify fewer targets in the dark. 

For that reason, I don’t view power outages as temporary nuisances, but rather as existential threats. This association defies all logic and reason. That is why it is part of deep-rooted trauma. 

I tell myself that this is Los Angeles in 2025, not Tehran in 1988. This often soothes me, until I see the ominous smoke clouds in the sky. Our eyes, even when wide open, have an amazing capacity to deceive us. Though this week, your skies truly resembled a war zone. 

But you, my city, were and remain the answer to my trauma. Growing up, there was no access to interventions for me and many others, such as therapists specializing in adolescent PTSD. The Pacific Coast Highway was our intervention, its timeless open road and iconic structures our therapists. 

And I will return to PCH in time, grateful to be trapped in maddening traffic beneath a blue sky, rather than a mile-long cloud of dangerous black smoke. The sky will no longer appear as if it’s on fire. It will return to its normal, wonderful, polluted state. Bright blue but polluted. Pathetically polluted, but not on fire. 

And if I can help, I will roll up my sleeves and help rebuild those iconic spaces. One day, I will enter them, and leave with a wondrous renewal of gratitude, humility, and maybe, just maybe, a small pocketful of peanuts.  


Tabby Refael is an award-winning writer, speaker and weekly columnist for The Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles. Follow her on X and Instagram @TabbyRefael.

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