Newsletter #23: So Much To Be Thankful For This Holiday Season

Happy Holidays!

2025 was a tumultuous year, and yet we have so much to be thankful for.

We know now that the Palisades Fire was initially set by an arsonist literally as the clock struck midnight on New Year’s Day 2025.  Seven days later that partially unextinguished, smoldering burn scar, re-ignited.  Fueled by 85 mph winds, it raced down the hillside towards our homes.  I was in my home office the morning of January 7th on work calls.  After a frantic evacuation, I stood with my golden retriever on the ridge of the nearby canyon and watched helplessly for several hours as the flames and 1,300 degree temperatures gobbled up our town.

The day after the fire re-ignited, as I attempted (unsuccessfully) to return to see what was left of our home, my car was rear-ended by a gawker taking pictures of the pillar of smoke while driving.  My car was totaled. 

Not a good start to the year.

Two days after the fire, I hiked six miles and navigated around the police blockade and dozens of looters to finally survey the still-burning aftermath.  In the midst of the destruction, I was shocked to find our home intact: particularly because the last image I had from my security cameras (before the wifi went out) was of flames flying over and around our house.  I was even more stupefied to learn we never lost power throughout the fires, and therefore I was able to download locally all the video from that night from inside our smoky – but still standing - house. 

Almost a year later, it still is disturbing to watch the video of our neighbors’ homes exploding and burning.  But also on that video, in the midst of that terrible night, was the San Luis Obispo fire department stopping in our driveway at 2:30 AM after several other fire engines had already stopped briefly, assumed our house could not be saved, and drove off.  Seeing the fire burning from behind our house, the SLO firefighters calmly broke down our gate and marched into our backyard through thick smoke and scalding temperatures.  They sprayed down our house and extinguished the fire that had already engulfed our back hedge and fences, and which began to burn our garage exterior wall.  There is no doubt that our house, too, would have burned down had those heroes not shown up at that time. 

You will see two pictures at the top of this newsletter: the first is of the San Luis Obispo firefighters in our backyard that night, risking their lives to protect our house.  The second was taken this Monday, as I met those same firefighters back in San Luis Obispo for the first time.  We have so much to be thankful for in this holiday season – a feeling that overwhelmed me as the heroic San Luis Obispo firefighters recounted to me story after story of their actions that night to protect the homes of complete strangers. 

This holiday season, I am extremely thankful that more lives weren’t lost despite the catastrophic Palisades Fire.  I am also thankful for our family and friends that rallied around us in the weeks and months following the fires.  Importantly, I am very thankful for the investors in Ocampo Capital that steadfastly believe in our vision and allowed us to not only successfully close Fund I less than three months after the fire, but to help us make lists of the top consumer venture capital funds of 2025 by funds raised.  And I am extremely thankful for the amazing teams of founders and employees at the portfolio companies we worked with every day in 2025.

Oh- and I can't forget those heroes from San Luis Obispo.

We still are unable to return to live in our house yet, given all the remediation work that was needed following the fires.  And the community’s collective emotions are still very raw, particularly given some of the details that emerged since about the lack of fire preparedness in the city of Los Angeles.  At the same time, I personally struggled for months to process the survivor’s guilt, and the huge role that luck played in determining our fate that night.

Nine hundred years ago, the Anselm of Canterbury wrote “disasters teach us humility.”  I would hasten to add that disasters also teach gratitude, and make clear the difference between what matters and what doesn’t.  In 2026, I hope to continue to embrace that spirit with Ocampo Capital, as a symbol of the growth that will also come with the resurrection of Pacific Palisades.

Happy holidays to you all, and my best for a healthy and happy 2026.