A few secrets I found in Fire

I’ve always been most active mid to late day and I think that may have brought me to appreciate fire.

I enjoy bonfires and the beauty of dancing flames but there’s nothing like reading (safely) by a fire!

I wasn’t raised with a clear understanding or enforcement of religion/spirituality so I’ve just been figuring it out over time.

Fire is kinda magical. Most spiritual ideologies agree and give fire a power.

I’m not native, but there was a time I lived on a North Dakota reservation. (this is a weird story, but details in another post).

My birth-giver would ‘disappear’ for a while, and my 5-year-old brain would convince me I was Ray Chapman Andrews*. I’d go on mostly dangerous “missions” and ran across wise natives who taught me, fire is cleansing.

My parents’ ‘stellar’ parenting skills gave me ample unsupervised time to experiment and learn about fire.

In my defense; fireworks are pretty cool, I didn’t have a lot of knowledge about life, and there were no adults to stop me – So….

It would take me decades to fully appreciate this knowledge.

(Disclaimer; never ever leave a child alone with incendiary. Honestly, just don’t leave children to their own devices, they’re not really good at staying out of trouble. On that note; it is never smart to leave a 5-year-old in charge of 3 younger children – they may earn a Darwin award).

Over time, I developed the idea that a bonfire was a way to ‘clear my mind’.

I also spend A LOT of money on fireworks around summer and keep them to shoot them off for minor achievements

I would write wishes and special communications on a piece of paper and throw it in the fire. It’s really fun if you’re into that sort of thing.

I also collected *A TON* of cool fire pictures

As time progressed, I noticed a deeper respect for fire.

I felt a psychological release when I made my bonfires. I started letting go of some of my hoarded papers (that all writers have) to the fires I created.

The letters I threw into the fire became more heartfelt. I felt safe with the secrets I threw into the fire.

My enthusiasm slowly grew to questions and then well wishes.

The whole time I took pictures.

Fire is just so free – so beautiful – and one day I’ll have more to say that doesn’t make me seem like a witch or a pyro