Fire takes family's home and possessions but not memories

A couple of days a week Diana Smith sits in a lawn chair on a empty lot, a piece of property that until Dec. 7, 2017, was adorned with her family's two-story, four-bedroom, 2 1/2 bath, 2,400-square-foot home and two freestanding barns.

"Honestly, when I'm here it still feels like home to me," said Smith. "I guess home's not a building, it's the memories. It's a great place and I love being here. I'm so thankful my kids got to be raised here."

The house that veterinarian Dr. Geoffrey Smith bought from the builder in 1980, the home in which the Smiths raised their four kids and celebrated all holidays and special events, was destroyed in minutes by the Lilac fire. It was one of the four out of five homes that burned down on the 31600 block of Wrightwood Road in Bonsall.

Diana was home with her 93-year-old mother-in-law, Lynette Smith, when the Lilac fire broke out. When she saw a hillside to the northwest on fire, she helped her mother-in-law to the car and they departed with the family pets at 12:45 p.m.

"I 100 percent thought I was coming home that night," said Diana. "I think it was because 10 years ago when we had a shake shingle roof and had to evacuate (because of the Rice Canyon Fire) and I really thought our house was going to burn down, it didn't. (This time) I thought, 'I'm not going to burn down, I have a great roof and everything is nice.' So I just shut the windows so when I came home that night the house wouldn't smell smoky."

Diana was so confident her home wasn't going to burn that she only grabbed one possession before leaving – a pearl necklace that her husband had given her on their honeymoon in Maui.

"I opened the jewelry box and rather than taking the whole thing, which would have been faster, I took out the pearls and that's it," said Diana. "One thing."

The decision not to take the jewelry box also resulted in a cash loss as it contained $1,500, ironically, "for emergencies."

Geoffrey was at veterinary seminar in San Diego at the time of the fire and lost everything but the clothes he was wearing.

"Hindsight, if I'd known we weren't coming back to a house there would have been so many things I would have grabbed, but they're gone," said Geoffrey, adding that he had just had his woodshop in the lower barn "completely decked out with new equipment."

Although valuable possessions lost included a Louis XIV vase, Geoffrey bemoans losing one thing above all others.

"I had 12,000 family pictures on a digital external drive that I never put in the cloud, and they're gone," said Geoffrey. "Camping trips, graduations, Eagle Scout awards, trips to Australia, trips to Alaska...the pictures are gone. That one hurt."

The loss of a beloved home and cherished possessions weighed heavily on Geoffrey although he tried to never let it show.

"Veterinarians, we're not so much trained but we have the mental pattern of we don't panic," said Geoffrey. "I mean, you bring me a dog spurting blood out with a broken bone and in pain and the last thing you want is this veterinarian screaming, 'Oh no!' We tend to take things calmly.

"But internally though I was a mess," continued Geoffrey. "I'd wake up thinking about, 'oh I lost that, I lost that.' I didn't sleep for weeks. As far as the front, I was in control because, you know, I'm a husband and a father and you don't want your kids and your wife to see you lose control.

"It hurt and it still hurts but you also have to accept reality that the most important thing, human life, was preserved," Geoffrey continued. "Family counts and material things don't. Material things are temporal, and I believe in the eternity of us, so that's what you have to grab on to."

So what is it like to lose everything and have to start over?

"It's kind of surreal," said Diana. "It's just weird. I can't even put a word on it. You have absolutely nothing. The first thing I did I went to Ross and I'm trying to find towels and sheets and shoes and underwear for my family. You have zero."

The one thing the Smiths would have was plenty of support from the community.

"What shocked me was the amount of help from strangers, it just overwhelmed me," said Diana. "It was just amazing. People I didn't even know were pouring out help and love and gifts and towels and sheets and things."

The Smiths attend North Coast Church and a friend attends The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Members of both churches came through for the Smiths.

"North Coast Church was like, 'what do you need immediately," said Diana. "I had 70 Mormons on my property a couple weeks after the fire for full-on work cleaning up. A guy came from Utah because his house burned down 10 years ago and he said, 'I have to come here and help clean.'"

Diana was also impressed with the Red Cross.

"The Red Cross had everything set up at the Vista Library," said Diana. "You could go there and they had stations set up where you could get your marriage license, your driver's license, county services, even dog food."

Diana is also satisfied with how her insurance company has responded.

"I think the insurance is what we signed up for," said Diana. "We don't have any complaints at all about the insurance. They've been very good about paying what they should. We're already starting the process of rebuilding."

The Smiths are renting a home in Bonsall and hope to be in their new home in 18 to 24 months. Their architect is designing a single-story 3,000-square-foot home with three bedrooms and an office, three bathrooms, a three-car garage and a woodshop.

"I said what will draw me back to this house is if you build me a killer woodshop, and he is," said Geoffrey. "I saw the plans – it's going to be a nice woodshop."

Geoffrey, 70, who lost all records pertaining to his Fur & Feathers Mobile Veterinary Services – "the computer got fried, the backups got fried, all the client records got fried, the business phone got fried" – is going to start a new practice in Fallbrook at 427 N. Orange Street. It will be called North Orange Veterinary Clinic.

"I thought I was going to retire," said a smirking Geoffrey, who prior to the fire had been working one day a week at Fallbrook Feed and Fertilizer doing exams and blood work.

"It's a blessing that I'm opening another hospital because clients will come there and I'll be there Monday through Friday instead of one day a week."

Hardships test people and the Smiths appear to be handing this trying exam valiantly.

"What I learned about myself, without a doubt, you have to be flexible in life because if not, you're going to break," said Diana. "Be flexible."

Diana, who teaches at Vista Adult School, said she also learned – by being on the receiving end of it – the tremendous power of kindness.

"If I could give a bit of advice to anybody, when there is a need, jump at the opportunity to help somebody immediately," said Diana. "They will never forget your kindness. They will never forget it. Whether it's somebody in the hospital, take them something. Whether it's a lady who just had a baby, take them a meal. Whether it's a disaster, put on gloves and go out there for two hours or three hours and they will never forget that."