And so I assumed that it was a bullet right. Welcome to the Only Child Diaries podcast. I'm your host, Tracy Wallace. Have you ever felt like you didn't receive the how-to brochure on life, that you didn't get enough guidance about major life issues? So did I. You don't have to be an only child to feel this way. In my podcast we'll explore some of the best ways to better navigate adulting, while doing so with humor and light. Welcome everyone to the Only Child Diaries podcast podcast.

Today I'm going to tell you one of my Oscar night stories. I might have told you before, but it's worth repeating and I'm also going to tell you about my firsthand account of driving into one of the fire areas here, altadena. Let me start with that, because it's one of the more empathetic, sadder things, and then I'll end on a high note. So yesterday I wanted to go to this plant nursery that's up in altadena. It had suffered some fire damage. I had heard and I always wanted to go there because it specializes in camellias and and azaleas, of which I'm very fond of. We have a lot of shade on our property here and I had heard that at first they had suffered some loss. I had never been there before, by the way, but I'd heard that they were kind of the premier nursery for camellias. They were kind of the premier nursery for camellias, having a lot of specialized flowering plants that they had created, propagated themselves. So I was very interested in that, because in the local nurseries here it's very easy to find a white blooming camellia or a red blooming camellia, but something that is like a two-toned or a striped or pink and white or something harder to find. So I wanted to go there and I also wanted to support a business that had obviously suffered some loss. So I decided to go there. Saturday is one of the days that they're open they're not open every day and I knew again that they had suffered some loss and so I expected to see some of the fire damage in the area.

I drove up, got off the freeway and was driving along and I guess, when I think about my reaction, I feel like I was kind of naive in how I was going to react Because of course, like so many of us, I've seen the pictures, the film on TV, on the news, and so I know exactly what it was going to be. But as I drove up I saw some neighborhoods, some blocks, some businesses that were open, untouched. And then I kept going and I saw one lot that was burned, in the middle of things that were not burned burned down cars, et cetera on that lot. And then I kept going and then it started and there would be a block on this main street that was all burned, except maybe one house, which is so odd. And then I would look to my right, towards the east, and everything was gone. I mean, everything was burnt, everything was just mass destruction.

And as I proceeded north into Altadena, towards the mountains, I continued to see more and more destruction. And I, you know, again, I'm an empath kind of person, but I was really overwhelmed by what I saw. I mean, seeing it in person, seeing it close up, was very impactful to me. And driving by some of the lots where there were people standing on what used to be their home, and just seeing the washed out, the burnt out, the remnants of these homes, it was a lot and I just felt like I wanted to just pull over, sit in my car for like an hour and just bawl my eyes out. I mean so much worse, so much worse than I expected. So it's devastating. And then, if you looked, if you. You know, if I look to the east, it just it's just as far as I could see.

So anyway, I kept, I kept going north to find the nursery, where there I guess it was like drainage channels in the mountain, there, the foothills of the mountain, and there were tractors and things that they had, I guess, scraped the dirt and the mud. But then you were competing on this little tiny street for the dump trucks. I pulled into the parking lot of the nursery and the dump trucks were just continually going back and forth, back and forth from this burnt out mountain, the hillside there, hillside there. Don't know exactly where they're going, but I can assume that they're just pulling off the dirt, scraping the dirt from the foothills and then taking it somewhere. So, anyway, pulled into the parking lot of the nursery and composed myself and said well, tracy, you just got to pull it together and started walking through the nursery.

And I'm talking about this is not just like your little neighborhood nursery, this is like acres and acres of plants that they have just all sorts of colors, camellias, azaleas, all sorts of just. I mean, as far as you can see, the public area and then the staff only area and they don't want you to touch anything yourself because they want the staff to tag it for you and put it aside and then bring it to the front. So I had to wait and I was wandering around and there's this area in the middle of the property that was a grove of maybe 20 palm trees and they were burnt, but surrounded by the nursery plants, and so I took a picture of that and I'll share that on social media, and also the northern part of the property was burnt. I understand that they did lose a significant amount of plants that were in the fire and some of the outbuildings that they had. So anyway, but business as usual, and very grateful to support, be able to support this wonderful place that had just these absolutely stupendous specimens of camellias and azaleas. So anyway, that was that, camellias and azaleas. So anyway, that was that.

And I've continued to meet several people who have lost their homes and they've moved into our town, our city, renting a home, renting an apartment, and kind of blown away by how they're coping and how just they're getting on with life. And I know they've had dark days, I mean I can only imagine but they're moving on and at least seemingly right. They're moving on and they're doing what they have to do. So there's a lot more to say about that, but that was a little snippet of my experience this weekend. Anyway, today is the Oscars, and for me the Oscars have always been watching. The Academy Awards has always been a very celebratory event. I've always enjoyed it. I've always loved watching movies, and so I've enjoyed seeing the celebrity, the dresses and the political statements and the comedy and the mishaps that they have. One year. I just want to tell you my story. So one year now.

This was back when I was in college. I was working retail at the May Company and for those of you that are too young to remember the May Company or maybe you're not from this area or the United States the May Company was a department store back in the day when department stores were very popular and it was all over the Southern California area. I'm not sure where else it was besides our area area. I'm not sure where else it was besides our area, but the May Company, mayco was kind of mid-range. They ended up being absorbed into Macy's. Macy's bought them out and I worked there part-time in college. I was a salesperson. I started out as a floater because they didn't really necessarily have a department for me. So I was a floater for about six months, which was interesting.

Sometimes it was frightening because if I was in a department where I knew the stuff, if I knew like, clothes are easy, you got a tag, you ring it up, you take the cash, you process the card, you're all set, it's easy. But in some of the departments, like housewares, you know, I I didn't know about housewares. My nightmare department was China, because nothing ever had a tag on it. Most of the stuff had to be ordered. People would go, oh, can I order this pattern? Or, you know, I've got the registry I want to put this. I'd be like I have no. I'd always have to go and get help and they'd always say, oh, you're doing a great job. And I'd be like I have no idea what I'm doing. And they'd never put me in cosmetics. They'd never put me in shoes and they'd never put me in men's suits, because those were all commissionaries. Oh, and fine jewelry.

But the other nightmare department was candy, because if somebody was buying a box of candy, that was fine, but a lot of people would buy the bulk, you know candy. They'd come up and they'd say I want a quarter pound of that, or you know, and then you'd have to weigh it, which was always a little iffy. Anyway, I can tell you that it just didn't seem like a very sanitary kind of purchasing experience. And then you'd have to figure out what the code was, because the candy didn't have a code on it. This was before barcodes I'm dating myself but way before barcodes and so that was always like, ooh, don't put me in candy. And I never knew where I was going to go until I got to work. So I couldn't mentally prepare. Anyway, so this one night was Oscar night. This is when the Oscars used to be on Monday night, and you would know because nobody would be in the store on Oscar night. Nobody went anywhere. This is before things were streamed. So if you wanted to see the Oscars you had to be at home watching the TV.

So after I was a floater, I worked in Mike's place that's what they called it. It was like the kind of young men's, contemporary men's clothing, casual clothing section, and I worked there for quite a while before I went into women's shoes and I was at the register and there's, like I said, there's hardly anybody in the store and I heard this popping sound from across the store, way across the store, and I looked and I saw this commotion and all this activity and I heard people yelling and this was over in the direction of the fine jewelry department. And so I was standing there and I heard something whiz by me in the air, just whiz right by my ear, and I instantly ducked and I fell down to the floor and then I heard something hit the wall next to me. And then I heard something hit the wall next to me and my friend, who's still my friend, craig my friend at the time worked over across the way in men's suits and he loves to tell the story about how he heard this going on. He saw it and he looked over at me and he saw this flash of blonde hair falling, saw this flash of blonde hair falling. My hair kind of went up because I fell down so fast. My hair went up and flew up and he sort of laughs about it, and so I assumed that it was a bullet right and it turned out that, yes, some people had come in to rob the fine jewelry department. They had brought in sledgehammers and they went to the glass and they started trying to break the glass. They grabbed some jewelry and there had been an off-duty police officer in the area beyond that, in women's shoes, and he had pulled out his gun and shot at, hello, shot at one of the robbers, and the bullet, you know, had come right. So when the police arrived and all this commotion and everyone was freaking out, and no, they didn't close the store to customers, which you'd think that they would have done.

And I told one of the supervisors, I said I think the story. And I said, look, this is what happened. And I heard it and it hit the wall. And they said, oh, no, that couldn't, that couldn't have happened. And I said, well, I heard it. And then I heard something hit the wall and they said no, no, no, they couldn't, it couldn't have gone that far, that's I mean, it was, it was way across the store. And they said, no, it could never have happened. And I said, well, I heard it hit the wall, just go look.

And so the police officer went over and looked and, sure enough, yes, there was a bullet. It hadn't had enough force to actually go in the wall. It had hit the wall and fallen to the floor because the wall at that part was like a brick. So I guess it would have had to have more inertia. Is that physics? I'm not sure it would have had to have more inertia at that point to go in.

Anyway, they did find the bullet. I was right. I told you there was a bullet. It went past my head. I heard it. I know what I heard. It wasn't a fly, it was a bullet. Anyway, that is my Oscar night story. Anyway, I'm just glad that it didn't have more inertia going past me. It didn't hit me. That would have been really scary, I mean, if it had hit my head or something or any part of my body, but that would have been a worker's comp claim for sure.

And then there was some time later when I was in the women's shoe department, which was across from fine jewelry and it was very busy, it was an Oscar night and some other people came in to rob the fine jewelry department and I didn't hesitate. Once I saw that there was some commotion, I just immediately dropped behind the counter. I wasn't going to take any chances. Not that the counter would have saved me, but it would have at least provided some barrier to me and any kind of bullet. So, yeah, so that's it. So I hope that everyone has had a good week.

It's now March, which is hard to believe March 2025. And next week, well, we're going to tackle another topic together. I hope you'll join me. If you like this episode, please follow the Only Child Diaries podcast on Apple Podcasts or other platforms you might listen on and consider rating Only Child Diaries and writing a review. It helps others to find us. Please share it with a friend you think might like it as well. Visit my Instagram page Only Child Diaries or Facebook Only Child Diaries Podcast. Thanks for listening. I'm Tracy Wallace and these are the Only Child Diaries, thank you.