A Warm Beat
A Fire in Late November
Thanksgiving is this week. Time doesn’t move any faster at year’s end than it did 11 months ago, but late November to January often feels like a blur.
My writing is a way to move from blurry feelings to focused insight.
Outside our townhome’s back doors, green grass pokes through the melting snow. In mid-October, landscapers bound the limbs of our trees lining the fences. It’s preparation for the many feet of Eastern Sierra snow that’s yet to fall.
The bare Aspens look like tied twig bundles, while our bound Maple stands like a red-leaf-bunched bouquet. These outdoor changes mark a constantly thumping rhythm. My wife, Lynn, and I want to feel the beats before they’re gone.
A few nights ago, I split some kindling for a fire. The wedges of dried cedar creaked under the splitter’s cleaving iron. The creak, the kindling’s hollow clang, the burning wood’s crackle, are all products of curing these cedar wedges for about seven months.
Lynn started collecting Sugar Pine cones in late April. The cone’s scales often drip with a flammable resin making them a good fire starter. In our fireplace, under the cedar kindling, I placed one of the cones then ignited its scales.
As the fire burned, Lynn and I sat on our couch, enjoying the warm flames.
That night in our living room, we shared a beautiful beat near the end of this year’s pulsing rhythm.
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