For those of you who regularly read my blog, I offer my sincere apology for my long absence from this site. At the very least, I should have posted that I was going to be gone for a while. I didn’t, and for that I am truly sorry. This past summer was…hectic and for a lot of people it was truly awful. I observed the horrendous effects of the worst wildfire season in BC ever recorded from a ground-level position. My home thankfully didn’t burn down, but I was a DPS (Disaster Psychosocial Services) Psychological First Aid responder for fire evacuees who flooded the Kamloops Evacuation Centre. All you can really do when you are deployed as a DPS responder is to listen with empathy and help people who are in shock at what happened to them. I described the experience to my ever patient and supportive family as “counselling on steroids.” Wildfire season isn’t over yet in BC, but Evacuation Centres are turning into Resilience and Recovery Centres so for the time being, I have returned to my home base. I may deploy again in the next little while for the next Climate Disaster: floods, earthquakes or whatever else the gods of climate change decide to inflict upon BC. As far as my home base goes; Tom and I have moved into a lovely, older house on a quiet cul-de-sac in Kamloops. Yes, DPS counselling wasn’t busy enough (insert sarcastic tone), I had to pack up our condo and move. I’m currently sitting in my new home office, surrounded still by unopened packing boxes, wondering why I’m so f!@#ing tired. Oh, that’s right! I have MS and MS doesn’t react well to stress. Duh! At least I can get outside into my yard with my walker or wheelchair or even my cane on a good day and hug a tree for support. Also, I promise that if I deploy again, I will post my impending blogging absence on this site. Happy Fall everyone!