Rebuild Life: Fire Displacement Relief

I am seeking support in raising the money to purchase a box truck to live in after losing my housing and all of my work/clients in the aftermath of the LA fires.

My suddenly price-gouged backhouse in El Sereno on January 17th was the longest place I have lived after being in 10 different places since August, all on the quest to stable housing after a violent eviction and theft.

I am an artist , end of life doula, and professional petsitter. Most of my work over the last year has been trade or pro bono, including serving Scott's House (a non-profit dying home in Santa Fe, New Mexico). I believe deeply in service. Despite totally rebuilding my petsitting business in Pasadena and Altadena since November, all of my new clients were also displaced by the fires.

I have performed at the Institute for Contemporary Art in Santa Fe, have several outstanding art residency applications, and am currently offering free grief circles at area studios and organizations to support others affected by the fires.

I am hopeful that others will acknowledge the plight in this scenario—not only of homeowners, but also those of us less fortunate—who, as tenants and without any family to turn to, have already been suffering as refugees of climate change and capitalist greed, forced into tenuous housing scenarios and living in our cars as competition for rentals skyrockets all over the country.

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losing my housing in the aftermath of the LA fires

I have not known what to say about the LA fires. After months of housing instability that brought me back and forth across the country, I returned to Los Angeles in November and restarted my life and businesses after losing what felt like everything to landlord violence in Santa Fe in August. If you know me well, you know that I have been an entirely new person the last two months. The east side of LA, which continues to be ravaged by the Eaton fire, has been my truest beacon of home in this and other lives. For so many who are the “black sheep” creative weirdos in their family, LA is home before any other place, even when we leave. I cannot express what I personally have felt about this loss of life, land, continuity, and “home”, just from the fires alone.

But, as the fires continue to burn and we are forgotten by the media circus, the aftermath is its own separate tragedy: air quality experts are saying it’s not safe to be in the LA area for an expected 2 years—many of us near to these areas may very well get cancer and perish in the upcoming years, like those living near the towers in 9/11. I don’t want to fear monger, but this is the current state of expert concern and consensus even while our government scrambles to do almost nothing. I think we are all doing our best to manage this incoming information and make calm and appropriate decisions for our communities and individual lives and well-being.

From mid-November until Friday, January 17th, I had a lovely little back house in El Sereno with a very generous temporary rental agreement while I got back on my feet. It was less than 4 miles away from the nearest evacuation zone, and I watched with terror on Watch Duty (and across the hill from me, where another small fire erupted) as the fire perimeter approached the arroyo that borders Highland Park/Pasadena/Eagle Rock, with a straight shot down through multiple open space areas right to where I was living (which was not so unlikely if the radical winds returned). When the fires started on January 7, I stayed in place with all of my most precious belongings packed into my car, ready to evacuate.

As many of you have probably heard, 27 people have died and more than 12,000 structures have been destroyed. Rents have skyrocketed in the wake of this continuing disaster as tens of thousands of families are displaced by the fire and devastation. Curbed noted: “It’s against the law to increase a rental price by more than 10 percent once a state of emergency has been declared; this fact doesn’t seem to be worrying the agents jacking up the numbers on open listings to desperate Angelenos. That behavior can result in a fine or even jail time. But according to sites like Zillow, the gouging is rampant anyway.” Some residents have seen increases in prices or rooms they are renting or houses that they are leasing go up by 100%, 200% or even 300%, according to LA County District Attorney Nathan Hochman.

Hearing this (undoubtedly), on January 17th, our landlord shook down my roommate (who I was subletting from), and my roommate shook down me, trying to get more money to stay in the place. Though this had not been disclosed to me until recently, she had not been paying rent since October. I just lost all of the new client base I had built up as a petsitter (as almost all of my clients lost homes or were displaced by the fire) and am still in the developing stages of my end of life doula business (most of which I do pro bono)—so, I didn’t have additional funds to give her. I was only given a few hours to get my things. Instead of facing violence again, I left (unable to get into the house to use the kitchen or bathroom, anyhow, as she had locked me out).

Regrettably, once a situation is aggressive or includes threats of violence, there is not much use to legal actions that could take months and endless hours of intense emotional energy. I have already learned this from my experience in Santa Fe. I also chose not to call the police because my roommate has a two year old child who would not have understood the situation and had already been significantly impacted by the fires.

my extended housing saga

On August 2, Tucker (my 18 year-old pug-beagle) and I fled our housing in Santa Fe, New Mexico after our landlord broke in threatening violence when I remained in our home to wait out legal eviction and to countersue for failing to fix several major habitability issues and other lease agreements (he has since also stolen roughly $5,000 in deposits that he illegally charged me but charged no deposits to a male neighbor on the property). We were threatened and harassed by local police when we called (landlord comes from an elite local family), denied a restraining order (very unusual), and forced to leave the town we’ve called home for a year to find safety during the heatwave. We went from New Mexico to New Orleans to Chicago.

In total, we moved 7 times and spent about 9 days in our car in high temperatures between 90 and 105 degrees before a sudden health issue forced me to put Tucker down (we had only 5 more days in that housing situation). We applied to hundreds and hundreds of housing opportunities, in five different cities, but no one would take a dog. By the time I had put Tucker down, I had been displaced from all of my clients and out of work and caring for him nearly full time for months. Afterwards, I was devastated. I only just felt as if I was back on my feet in the weeks prior to January 7th. He transitioned on October 2nd, Gandhi's birthday. I miss him so much and think every day about how much time we may have had together without those circumstances.

my current situation

I have temporary housing in Highland Park crashing with a friend for at least the next week and potentially longer. I lost all of my newly established clients for my "work" job as a petsitter, but have reached out to several former clients in other areas that I have worked. In my "heart" role, I am unwilling to charge for grief services for those affected by the fires. I have an autoimmune condition, mast cell activation disorder, and am intensely impacted by the current air quality and have already developed strange symptoms and am hopeful to have the capacity to get away from the air as soon as possible. I do not have a relationship with my remaining family.

why help me buy a vehicle to live in?

I am exhausted after nearly 6 months of instability after landlord theft and violence. I am truly devastated to think of leaving Los Angeles, and even though staying here full time appears to be unsafe for me, I am hoping that opting to invest money--that I would otherwise spend on a mere 3-4 months of rent--to instead allow me the means to return to the city regularly to provide whatever support I can is a choice that better meets the needs of a rapidly evolving world.

I was placed into this scenario also during COVID, and lived for two years in a Prius C--that lifestyle is no longer sustainable for the energy that I am desperately trying to put into this world.

If you have read this far and know of any residencies or work-trade opportunities that might allow me some stability in the coming months, even if far from Los Angeles, please reach out to me: @embodiedrealization