A Day of Black Widows

A day in the life of a heat wave: Wednesday, June 27, Los Angeles. The city swelters.

By 7 a.m., the temperature is already 94 degrees.

A soft wind blows, and the high tips of our oak trees swirl like twigs in a whirlpool. Those of us who dwell in canyons recognize the deadly eddies.

It’ll be a long day.

An edgy stillness lies over the neighborhood, simmering in the relentless heat of morning. Anxiety is a haunting presence. Past fires sear into the memory. Images of burning homes and crying people fill my head.

I see ghost flames rising over a ridge behind my house, fingers of fire clawing at the starry sky. I hear the banshee howl of remembered sirens . . . .

I brush away the memory and walk down the driveway to get the newspaper. The dog Hoover follows, glances at the cat and keeps going, too hot to chase anything.

“A bad day,” a woman says as I pick up the paper. She passes each morning, always with a warning.

“We’re a tinderbox,” I say, repeating the phrase of a county fire inspector.

I had spoken with him earlier about a small brush fire that had scorched a corner of Topanga. He said, “It’s just the beginning.”

“Beware of black widows,” the woman says, striding up the road to the state park. “They come out when the temperature reaches 100.”

I watch her disappear over a rise. Hoover tries a weak bark. As I walk back into the house, I unconsciously brush away a cobweb.

An hour later, the temperature has reached 100. At 17%, the humidity is in a nose dive.

I try to write, but even with an air conditioner going, it’s hot. I’m restless. My mind is on that fire the day before near Mulholland.

Firemen and helicopters hit it fast. Without them, there is no measure to the calamity that might have ensued. Dry grass and chaparral are a combustible blend in the Santa Monicas.

“Canyons tend to funnel the wind,” the fire inspector had said. “It’s a blast furnace effect. Santa Anas can throw embers a mile ahead.”

Firemen may be our last heroes. I met one in Malibu who’d been a cop and had switched. I asked why. “I want to save people,” he said, “not shoot them.”

10 a.m. As I leave the house, the temperature has climbed to 106 degrees. My wife’s roses wilt in the front yard. Ivy dies on the slopes.

At Topanga Center, Mexican dayworkers laze in the heat, torn between finding work and doing nothing.

“ Muy caliente ,” I say to one of them. He falls to the ground in a feigned heat stroke. Others laugh. Muy caliente for damned sure.

Traffic builds along the ocean. We flock to the beaches when the city sizzles. Where do they go in Omaha?

A car vapor-locks and traffic comes to a stop. I see it being pushed to one side, but still the traffic only creeps. Soon I learn why.

Its owner is a dazzling young woman in a string bikini. Cool beauty on a sweltering day.

At 11 a.m., the temperature hits 107 and the humidity drops to 11%.

Heat waves always come as a surprise in L.A. Forget that we’ve had them since time was a kid. We’re never prepared.

“This is the worst,” we say in our homes and offices, in coffee shop kitchens and on road-paving jobs. “This is unbearable.”

I think about driving from one end of the county to the other, but I’d have to cover 4,000 square miles. It would take a helicopter.

I meet a friend for lunch at a place with no air conditioning. He greets me by saying, “Oh, for the simple decency of a rainy day. . . .”

The temperature starts down at noon and the humidity edges up. 103 degrees and 12%.

I listen to the local news: another peace fast by activist Jerry Rubin, a press conference by a Russian rock band, a fund-raiser for Dianne Feinstein.

And then it had to happen.

Into this tedium of non-news, fire. Glendale, Temescal Canyon, Carbon Canyon, Santa Barbara. Trees, grass, brush . . . homes. I can almost hear the cries of anguish.

They burn through the terrible afternoon. At 5 o’clock, the mercury dips below 100 and the humidity is rising, but it’s too late. I consider going to Glendale, but decide not to. I’ve seen homes burn. I can’t bear to see it happen again.

By nightfall, the temperature is down to 78 degrees, the humidity up to 29%. I head for home.

A woman on the block sunbathes by starlight for its special physiological benefits. A man sits on his rooftop with a pitcher of martinis, watching for fires.

Ah, Topanga.

I start to fall asleep about midnight with the temperature at 73 degrees. Just before I drop off, I think about black widows, fire and the simple decency of a rainy day.