Backblip.  Behind the scenes, Laurel Street.

And I am behind on blip as usual.  I guess it's the showing up that counts but sometimes on days like this one wonders if one wants to remember and record here.

I was in the vicinity of the fatality involving a person on the tracks and a Caltrain.   It was at one of the level crossings I regularly use and post here on blip.  It's going to feel weird there for a while. 

But I went on with my day, like everyone else that was on the train or nearby.  Probably feeling weird, like me.  (I don't know how the train engineer and first responders cope with this stuff.)  I went to Walgreens to pick up an rx, the interminable line, but it yielded an impromptu and surprisingly deep conversation with another woman waiting.  She'd given up standing and was sitting in a chair near where I was stretching and moving as I'd been standing so long.  She asked me where I'd got my bag - it's the conversation starter bag, it just is - Portland, I replied.  Oh that's too far for me to go, she said.  We laughed.  And then it went on from there, about living in other places, family...  Then it was my turn at the counter and we said goodbye.

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Joshua Tree is burning.  All those precious trees, gone forever.  The recovery outlook is very bleak.  And as I am behind but posting this 8/10, there are fires raging on Maui and on some of the other islands.  Horrendous.  We can relate from the fires we have here in CA.  Our reality.