It started with deciding to have a small fire while we were grilling. Der Bingle put in a fire starter and a couple of logs and I sat there watching the flames grow. One of the logs had a knothole which eventually burned out, allowing a view of flames through it. I tried to catch it on camera, and maybe I did, but I’m not looking now.

I liked sitting there on a day close to 60 degrees, watching the fire – so I added more logs. There is a special pile at the corner of the shed consisting of decaying logs; I used them . . . it was time. Over ten years ago, Quentin, Mother, Daddy and I stacked a bunch of wood on two elevated rails. We burned a lot of it, but never seemed to get down to the bottom layer, then Daddy died and I just let it sit there because I remembered that fall day when the four of us put it there. Then Mother passed away and I still let it stay. To my Depression Era parents, this would have been considered wasteful.

Finally, last fall I got the message and took it off the rails and put it at the corner of the shed. But I left it there and it got snow-covered and ice-glued together and by this spring, it was a little more rotten. So yesterday I sat in the backyard with the firepit for about five hours and burned it. I don’t know what went up in smoke, but it kept me warm.