On Fire

You can learn a lot from this fascinating creature

I built a fire with my kids on a recent camping trip. It’s one of my favourite things to do. Everything’s there: planning, timing, proportion, risk, maintenance, reward, heat, smell, and beauty, to name a few. Not to mention mosquito repulsion! Let’s unpack this simple experience and see what we can learn.

This is the actual fire we built. Ain’t it pretty?

Planning

You need to have all your materials ready to go from the outset, or else you’ll be scrambling to find and add the right wood at the right time. On our outing, we were camping within the edge of a forest, next to which lay an alpine lake. After finishing our hotdog dinner, I looked behind us, into the forest, and was alarmed to see a menacing black wall of cloud that had crept up on us, hidden from view by the trees. Among other frenetic tasks, we quickly moved our pile of firewood into the “vestibule” of our backcountry tent, while collecting different sizes of kindling. The rain and hail arrived heavily about 5 minutes later. If we hadn’t done this quickly and right then, we would not have had any dry wood for the morning fire; we would not have had a fire at all.

I had to look up the name of the covered place in front of the tent door. Vestibule, got it.

Timing

There are no real short-cuts with building fires. If you add large logs too quickly, or too slowly, it will not start, or will go out prematurely.

Proportion

If the requisite mix of (dry) fuel, air, heat and flame gets out of balance, you have no fire. After the fire matured, I gambled and put a too-big wet log on top, as you can see in the photo above. It turned out to be too much for the fire’s capacity; it never really caught fire and dampened what was beneath it. It also made the fire less attractive, obscuring the flames.

Risk

You can burn yourself, or your children!

Maintenance

As a kid I was the fire-builder grandchild at my grandparents’ mountain home. I loved it. Fire-builders know that they don’t just build, they maintain. Regular poking, prodding, observing, and adjusting are necessary to keep a fire healthy and happy. I love that work—it’s simple yet challenging and interesting.

Reward

A successful fire is immensely satisfying. If you don’t know, well, you just don’t know. Do try it sometime.

Heat

Obviously a fire brings warmth! What a joy this can be on a cold outdoor (or indoor) morning. Just delightful. And as a team analogy, individual coals that get separated from the cluster burn out quickly. Those that stay “huddled” with the rest do not, while in turn they help the others stay hot. (Remember that others need you as much as you need them. Don’t go it alone!)

Smell

Another of its choice results, a campfire smell is, in my books, one of the best smells in the world.

Beauty

Flames, coals, gentle smoke, heat—these are beautiful things. And beauty is inherently wonderful and valuable. And all beauty points to the Beautiful One who created all. May He be praised forever.