Memorial Day

My late-start online class finally ended last Wednesday, praise be. I’ve been so busy with everything that there has been no time to blog. Let’s start with Memorial Day, since that was a happy time.

Pat and Nancy came were scheduled to arrive at 10:00 in the morning to help build a fire ring back by the creek and collect downed branches for an afternoon burn. Terry had been piling all the rocks he pulled from the field back there. Before they got there, Terry got busy with the weed whacker clearing away the garlic mustard in between some box elder trees.

When Pat and Nancy got there, we got busy moving stones. Terry told us the dimensions (which were enormous) that he had in mind and started trimming branches with his chain saw. We filled in one ring of stones like I’d always done at the Girl Scout camp and set about collecting wood. Terry came back and said, no, he wanted us to use ALL of the rocks in the wood pile. Well. He hadn’t mentioned that at the staff meeting.

And so we started piling on more rocks. It went fast in the sense that we made many trips and piled many rocks up in the space of 20 minutes. It went slowly in the sense that there were always more rocks. We decided to work until noon, when we would go back to the house for lunch. After lunch, we would collect more wood. We’d start the fire when Jane, Dave, and Mary (Jane’s brother and sister-in-law) got there. Dave, Mary, and Jane were taking a break from cleaning out their mom’s house.

At the end of an hour, we had not a fire ring, but a fire wall!



Starting the fire inside the stone fire wall

The fire got enormous, of course, and we had to keep moving our chairs back. At the proper distance, it was pleasant in the shade with the breeze blowing.

The fire when it got going

Nancy throws a big stick on the fire

Pat feeding the fired

We spent all afternoon clearing the woods and burning. We went up to the house for supper. While a cookout always seems like a good idea with a bonfire, the reality is that you would need to have 20-foot roasting sticks.

It was a very pleasant day and evening. We lingered over dinner, talking and laughing. All was right with the world.