Ah, the burn pile. It’s a fifteen-foot mound next to the parking lot, made of branches, benches, doors, two-by-fours, signs, bridges, blackberry brambles, English ivy pullings, and anything else someone thought should disappear but shouldn’t be thrown in the garbage. I’m a frequent contributor to the burn pile. In fact, just yesterday, I added an entire bridge to its heap. And today we started to burn some of it down.
It’s not as much fun as you might think. You don’t just get to light the pile and watch it go up. You light a little fire somewhere nearby, and then add to it, always taking care to keep the pile reined in so it doesn’t get too big. It sounds nice—you’d think you just get to sit around and add stuff every once in awhile—but it also gets rather hot. It’s hot enough that tonight my face looks sunburned. It’s hot enough that your breathing gets constricted. It’s hot enough that your clothes, drenched from a downpour, dry within a minute if you’re standing close enough.
I’d say we burned about a third of the pile today, in the eight hours we spent up there, getting muddy and soaked and hot and muggy. It was fun, and I think we’ll do it again tomorrow. Hurrah for getting a midwinter tan, eh?
No comments:
Post a Comment