LAUREN FRAYER, HOST:
This week marks a year since the start of the devastating Los Angeles fires, which destroyed thousands of homes in Altadena and Pacific Palisades. Many remain displaced, but some have been able to return home after months of cleaning away toxic soot and ash. Eighteen-year-old Zacharie Sergenian is one of them. He wrote this essay for member station KCRW about the moment when a particular sound in his neighborhood drove home what his community lost.
ZACHARIE SERGENIAN: After the Palisades fire tore through my neighborhood, the first time I cried wasn't at the sight of destroyed homes or the taste of smoke in the air. It was way later at the sound of a piano playing through the empty house.
(SOUNDBITE OF PIANO PLAYING)
SERGENIAN: Back in January, my morning was interrupted by a fire evacuation order. My family grabbed a few things and left with our dog. And while our house didn't burn down, it was damaged and full of ash that had to be professionally cleaned. For a long time, I was stuck in a daze. Between moving seven times, worrying about insurance and cleaning my ash-covered clothes and belongings, I was busy. All that on top of schoolwork, relationships and exams. I didn't get or give myself much time to process. I just went through the motions until one night, about six months after the fire.
I had spent the day outside with my friends, Sam and Emily. At about 9 p.m., outside an ice cream shop in West LA, I was struck with a brilliant idea of taking them to the Pacific Palisades. We were bored, and my friends hadn't been back since the fire. We headed to my house, which was finally cleared of ash and almost ready for my family to move back into. Driving through the Palisades at night is surreal.
(SOUNDBITE OF VEHICLE DRIVING)
SERGENIAN: When the damaged street lights are off and you only have headlights to show you the road, you don't see the shells of former homes, no clear plots or piles of burnt rubble, just darkness and the occasional coyote. We got out of the car and went into the empty house. I found some old Diet Coke cans, and we sat on the tiled floor trading jokes. Our house has a shiny, black baby grand piano in the family room, one of the only things that was left beside boxes of photos and some paintings. The remediation company covered it in a gajillion (ph) layers of plastic wrap to protect it while they cleaned. We uncovered it, and I pressured Emily into playing. Sam and I leaned against the body of the piano as Emily started.
EMILY: I don't want to touch that (ph).
(SOUNDBITE OF PIANO PLAYING)
SAM: (Inaudible).
EMILY: Yes. Is it?
SERGENIAN: We were mostly goofing off before, but then the mood totally shifted.
(SOUNDBITE OF PIANO PLAYING)
SERGENIAN: I realized that this was the first time there had been music in our house since January, maybe even the first time someone had played music on our block or street since the fires disrupted our lives. I started to cry. Looking back, it's made me recognize how important the sounds of living are to a neighborhood. Your next-door neighbor watching the game, a dog barking at a squirrel and even the booming leaf blowers are all evidence that a space is alive, home to other people, to your community.
(SOUNDBITE OF PIANO PLAYING)
SERGENIAN: A couple weeks later, my family moved back into our house, but the neighborhood is different. Only about half the houses survived, and many people still haven't returned. I would love to hear more sounds of life up here again.
(SOUNDBITE OF PIANO PLAYING)
SERGENIAN: For now, between me practicing on my bass guitar and my father working his way through Billy Joel's discography on our piano, we're doing our part.
(SOUNDBITE OF PIANO PLAYING)
FRAYER: That was Zacharie Sergenian in Pacific Palisades. A version of this essay first aired on NPR member station KCRW. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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