I live 5 minutes from a rural community that took a direct hit from the fires yesterday.

But at the time, I’m in the suburbs, sheltering in the air con as the fan-forced oven weather finally softens. My phone screams with far-away watch-zone warnings, and my parents tell me they’ve safely evacuated. I’m feeding and reassuring someone else’s cats, holding a hose in someone else’s garden, concerned about how embarassed I’ll be if I fall behind on cleaning and let the owners come back to a messy house; meanwhile, it’s no sure thing that I’ll have a home to go back to.

I reach for certainty and realise there’s no such thing. It doesn’t matter whether I know anything, whether I learn the outcome five minutes from now or two days. The choices are all made; things will be fine, or they won’t.

So, what do I do? Is there any part of this, whatsoever, that I can make better?

I guess I’ll water the garden.