Naked

My March 11th photo of North Lake Avenue showed a patch of hillside that was burned in a brush fire last August. That patch remained bare throughout the winter.

To get a different look at the burn, you don't have to go far up the Sam Merrill Trail before you face the area head-on across the canyon. The picture to the left was taken February 18th (not a good day for breathing). I took the picture below about a month later, March 17th. No doctoring, no Photoshop.



Click on the photos to enlarge them and you
can clearly see the difference between the two: we had rain. Things grew, and they didn't waste
any time doing it.

Rain could have meant mudslides in the burned area, where no plants had survived to hold onto the dirt and keep it there. The hillside could have come down onto that I-don't-know-what-you-call-it part of Pasadena's water-catching and -treating system you see at the bottom center.

But the hill held up and the brush is growing again. It won't be bright green for long, but that doesn't mean it's not healthy. Around here it's all scrub, chaparral and sage brush. By summer, the muted brown, gray and sage palette will dress the hills. Maybe that bare patch won't look so naked then.