Fire's jealous affection

Part of the problem with being an unwitting narrator is words have too much meaning. I’m a child playing with fire, a clown juggling grenades. 

In my rush to communicate these visions to you, know they are part truths. They are the things I saw. But you may see them differently. What I may call death, you may see as a poem. A forest fire leaves the woods more fertile.

                

Know this when you see a leaf in the wind. It may not be as helpless as it seems. 

                 

But this is gibberish; you’ll understand in time.

 
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I’m still in the woods, though the soil has turned moist and fertile. There’s a sweetness in the air. It’s almost erotic. 

Every day I run my car. I use it to charge my battery. I use that to run my computer, lamp, hot plate and whatever other things I need for the day. While the car is running, I often stretch out on the roof and feel the feeble warmth of spring on my face. This brings me so much joy that I can’t bring myself to run the car before the afternoon sun warms the hills. So my mornings consist mostly of cold coffee and oatmeal, cans of uncooked vegetables and leaning into the fire as I read old books and magazines. By late morning restlessness urges me out to go for a walk along the numerous creeks, listening to the groggy exuberance of life waking up from the apocalyptic cold. Partly, I think this routine helps me cherish my evenings of hot food and coffee and access to the Internet via my wireless card. What a gorge of pleasure that is every night.

                

 Winter was a bitch. This cabin is on the electric grid, but I stopped paying about two months ago so they shut it off. It seems most of my waking time since then has been spent writing and providing hospice care for the chronically pathetic fire in my fireplace. I never have enough dry wood, and I’m out of lighter fluid; I live in terror of dousing the poor thing with a soggy log and struggling for another hour-plus to get it re-lit.