Dear Editor,
Heaven has no finer angels than those earthbound people who selflessly give their time, their concern, and their resources serving those who are homebound during disasters.
They started coming to our house the evening after the Palisades Fire consumed nearby homes in lower Las Flores Canyon. Answering by candlelight to pounding on the front door, it was opened to three total strangers, a woman and two men bringing us bags of food, bottles of water, and offers to help us with anything we needed. In answer to our total surprise, Leah Sturgis, who had lost her home to fire, said they were acting on an internet posting asking for people to check on an elderly couple at our address.
We, the elderly couple, one confined to bed under hospice care, having lived in Malibu for 65 years, have never experienced nor witnessed such eagerness to help others.
The next day and daily for weeks thereafter, Chris Hanson, a native Malibuite and retired fireman, along with his wife Debbie and several of his friends, delivered heaps of food, cases of water, bags of ice, hot water for bathing, lanterns, flashlights, fire extinguisher, generator, and pledges to bring anything we needed.
Alyson Dutch, a retired EMT who had lost her home to fire, also answered the call. She and the aforementioned Leah Sturgis between them got through the barricades to deliver food, a nurse, and medicines at different times in the days and nights.
On numerous occasions firemen, sheriff deputies, fire brigades, Chris Frost, City workers, search and rescue teams, EMTs and surely others offered to help for anything we needed.
This outpouring of unexpected support started with Dianne Eusebio, the daughter of Cora Eusebio, and hospice caregiver who stayed during the ordeal. From the sheriff’s welfare list, Dianne learned we were OK. She found phone numbers for our neighbors, Mia Lauchli and Marcus Hirsh, Lindsey Taylor and Richie Rubin, who between the four of them alerted the internet and made phone calls from their evacuation locales to our benefactors.
Enough thanks cannot be given to friends and strangers who, despite our pleas to let us pay for their gifts or make donations to their causes, would only say, “We’re not organized. We are your neighbors. We only want to help.”
Thanks to all and, in return, we will try to be good neighbors to you in good times and bad.
Alanna and Fred Niles, Malibu