Wilderness creates community — it doesn't threaten it
Friday, June 24, 2011 at 3:50PM 
Successful backfire along the Mescal Ridge firebreak during the Basin Complex Fire in 2008.There are good fights and bad fights. And it isn't even a matter of always having to play nice. But a basic, even if begrudging, respect is required — and a willingness to really listen instead of simply shutting down.
I recently heard the management of a sports team described as a "team of rivals." At one moment everything might look like it will fall apart in a tension of strong wills. And then the next moment some subtle shift, or even a spectacular breathrough, might have just occurred that no one could see coming.
Mid-Coast Fire Brigade captain Cheryl Goetz leading a fire meeting in Palo Colorado during the Basin Complex Fire.I also heard someone once ask Wendell Berry...
"But aren't there too many people in the world?"
"There aren't too many smart people," he answered.
Sometimes you just can't have too many bright and energetic people in a room.
Aftermath of backfire and Basin Complex Fire looking eastward from Skinner Ridge.On the other hand, if when you fight, you just want to make sure you leave enough sharp broken edges lying around on the kitchen floor afterward...
...consider holding a public discussion on wilderness in Big Sur.
Upper Rocky Creek residents doing fire clearance along the Rocky Creek road.With understandably heightened anxiety about wildfire in the aftermath of the Basin Complex Fire, it becomes easy to project a false dichotomy between wilderness and community, as if the two values really were opposed.
But here in Big Sur, wilderness in all its forms, including wildfire (with whom we must be ongoingly mindful, respectful, and far-thinking), doesn't threaten community.
It creates it.
The Overstrom homestead "Alta Vista," Jeff Norman's home on Michael Ridge. And that's the beautiful shepherd Shay in the gloaming light on the hillside. Photo courtesy of Boon Hughey.We should do what we can to reduce the suffering that comes with the loss of homes — and especially with the loss of life itself.
Alta Vista, July 8, 2008, "Still Smoldering" from the Basin Complex Fire. Photo courtesy of Xasáuan Today.(For a particularly beautiful reminiscence of a much-loved "Historic Big Sur Homestead Lost in the Basin Complex Fire," see Xasáuan Today's "Remembering Alta Vista," and Part 2 of that reminiscence, "More Alta Vista Memories.")
Trail sign attributed to Steve Chambers.But at the same time, if we lose the wildness of this coast, we will have lost everything. We will have lost the very nature of what it means to be here in the first place.