So Close

Tired, haven't slept, haven't eaten enough. My beautiful Mackletree is a charred ruin. Last night after dark, the power out, was the closest approach, maybe a quarter-mile away from two directions. Oddly the most dangerous after the wind died, when the heavily fueled ground-fire could move in every direction. Almost bailed. Awful to see the glow of fire at night. This morning, though, power back on and the wind picked up from the usual NW, effectively blowing the fire directly away from me. Still out of control, and most of the crews are moved around to the other side, but mostly burned ground between the active flames and my ridge. The fire was set by a volunteer fireman. Rain forecast for tomorrow. Didn't drink last night, staying sharp for emergency situations, and I can't remember the last day I didn't have a single drink or beer or glass of wine. Heat some water for a bath, wash my hair, everything smells like smoke. A late lunch of morel duxelles on polenta, a new favorite dish. I wish shallots weren't so damned expensive. In all honesty, I don't use polenta but something available locally, Yoder's Cornmeal Mush, same product, half the cost. I used to make this myself, molded in soup cans with both ends cut off, but it always trashed the kitchen. The SW lobe of the fire, which I can still watch through a notch in distance ridges, is still producing roiling clouds of smoke. Disaster averted. Maybe I can leave the house tomorrow, I need things: tobacco, booze, some variety in my diet. I need to take a nap. I need to get into the museum to clean up after the jazz concert Friday night. It's interesting, the way my life, where it happens, is subject to events beyond my control, ice-storms and fires, floods and firings. I exert only the smallest effect on my environment. A fairly large foot and a small footprint, go figure. If I had been trapped, last night, I finally decided, I'd jump in the cistern; it's not part of the water system anymore (which has become a system based entirely on 5 gallon pickle buckets) but it is half full of scummy water, maybe 750 gallons, so it is part of the water system, a final retreat in case of fire. It's also the home of a race of beautiful pale green frogs. I could have holed up there, or face down in one of the puddles on the driveway, point is I could have survived: my house would have burned down, all of my books gone, my clothes, my toiletries, my computer (wherein is most of my life) and the various keepsakes that one collects. But the essential I could have survived. I could build a smaller house, now that I had fewer books. The books would be the hardest part, those that remain with me, the few thousand, I've mostly read more than once and I love them all, I use them in ways I don't understand, they create the mass of me. I think I'll be increasing the fire-break, and maybe buy a gasoline powered pump, so I could spray cistern water to dampen my approaches. Survival is often a close thing, being able to spray some water might turn the corner. And the closely following thoughts, about how long it was before they found my body. Just thinking, not an existential question, not wanting to bother anyone with an inconvenient body. D would probably find me within three days. For two days he'd hope I was holed up with Brandy or Misty, then he'd get concerned and find my body, charred beyond recognition but who else would have been there? It's either Tom or the robber. The story narrows. We get a close-up of his face, just when he starts crying. We live for first tears, and first anything else, as long as we live. Extreme situations alter your chemistry. We know this as a fact, all those chemicals you produce, to deal with situations. I'm sympathetic. What you thought you meant.