A note on fire and the hair trigger of memory

Sunset, during the August Fire Complex was otherworldly 9/28/20

A friend posted a photo of her sanctuary, a couthy glowing fire pit, and I found myself overreacting to the image of fire. I seem have developed an adverse knee-jerk reaction not only to the odor of burning wood, but also to photos of fire. A knot of fear that begins in the gut, then it encircles the heart, begins to squeeze its fist.

I grew up with wood heating, we had no other source of heat. It was my job to stack the wood for the coming winter. There was a satisfying rhythm to that work. The tump and twist of wood into a puzzle measured by the cord—4 x 4 x 8’ or so. As we laid in the wood, we’d venture to guess if it would be a two, or a three-cord winter. The wood stacking ritual marked the closure of one season, and the entrance to another—and to my birthday. 

I am no stranger to fire, I live in a house with woodstoves, you’d think I wouldn’t react to fire, or to woodsmoke. But I do. I used to love sitting close to the fire on cold winter days, the fire warming my face until my cheeks pulsed and throbbed. I was mesmerized by the strange hypnotic choreography of dancing flames. And seeing the heartwood, the distinct tree rings, their age cut short,  illuminated in the embers. Each tree ring, a birthday in the long count of time.

Yesterday I found a long-forgotten low fired pinch-pot I had fired in our fireplace long ago, it triggered memories of gathering and refining the clay, wedging a mixture of blue and iron rich clay into patterns, pinching it between thumb and finger, then firing it, lifting it from the ash, smothering it in husk and straw to cool slowly so it wouldn’t crack, silica annealed into the hardness stone.

This is the first year that the odor of smoke has affected me. Not the Tubbs Fire, the Paradise Fire, nor the Kincade Fire, but this fire season, beginning with the Walbridge Fire, and ending with the August Complex fires. It’s almost like having my own personal PTSD switch. A hardwired fight/flight syndrome kicks in. 

I first noticed it acutely around Halloween. Those pumpkins. Candle smoke, paraffin, a petroleum byproduct, diesel tinged with the odor of baking pumpkin pie. The mouthwatering thought of Thanksgiving, and things benign. Then begins the mental hell, checklist for evacuation. What to save? I have barely unpacked since my last evacuation. These are my sins. Always at the ready. Samhain, the gate to the Otherworld, open, always by fire.

Ever since the wildfires, I have been scanning and digitizing decades-worth of prints and negatives. Most of my writing and art is already scanned—except for my travel journals on the back burner. Soon. Sometimes I dream I am evacuating again. I sleep with my wallet, MacBook and hard drive within arm’s reach, my keys are already in the car, which doubles as a large go-bag. 

I have to talk myself out of my own tree when the terror begins. I run off a quick mental checklist to convince myself it’s merely woodsmoke from a fireplace. I remind myself it’s a benign, warm, cozy odor. I find that identifying the type of wood helps. Oh, that’s hardwood, that’s crisp black oak, pungent sizzling bay, or fruitwood. Apple or cherry? 

Mmm, applewood fire, the most pungent, the most extraordinary of odors. The secret heart, the perfume of a thousand apples released all at once like flocks of wild birds. The overwhelming odor of orchards in late summer. Mesquite barbecue. Bacon. Clean, pungent, mouthwatering gracenote. 

Someone in the neighborhood burning coal? Sniff sniff. I have the nose of a bloodhound. No, just the rotten bouquet of woodsmoke when the fire dies out. Someone needs to clean their chimney. Wildfire smoke is more complex, nuanced. More creosote laden. Greasy, acrid, but more electrical, with a slight overtone of burning brakes. Like the ember fall and the acrid ash blizzard that descended from the Glass Fire, covering the foliage with a strange blanket of snow.  

My relationship to fire has changed utterly. This year, our extraordinary sunsets came at such a cost. Fire is its own entity, far beyond our feeble attempts to comprehend it, and certainly far beyond our scope to tame it. As a child I was utterly in love with volcanoes, the secret heart of fire within the earth. Later, I watched molten rock plunge into the sea. Sublime beauty, and corrosive air, acrid rain. A terrible beauty.

These days, I see myself as if from the outside looking in. Bearing witness. The fire within burning bright. All I know is that there will be a prime factorization of proverbial candles on my birthday cake this year. I am mesmerized like a moth to flame. Fire-sign to the very end.

CZU Complex fire, Big Basin burning