☞ Food, Clothing, Shelter… and Fire!
I think in another life I may have been a pyromaniac.
I’m not, let us be clear, here. I was nowhere near Oldman Peabody’s barn at the time. But under slightly different circumstances, had my nature been nurtured or my nurture been natured, I could see my inner pyromaniac emerging. The spark is there. (I’m more of a two rocks guy than a two sticks guy, you see.)
These visions of smoldering ambers have danced in my head for years. In college I bought a Zippo despite not being a smoker… I just thought it would be cool to learn lighter tricks. And light girls’ cigarettes. Despite not being attracted to smokers. And girls who smoke not being attracted to me.
And like most boys, I was pretty into firefighting growing up. My best friend’s dad worked for the fire department and I was always a little too into the fire engine mode on the Hot Wheels video game for Commodore 64.
It wasn’t until a few days ago when I was back home in Guilderschlotzen for Christmas that this penchant for pyrotechnics really hit me, though. It was there I discovered fire. Cavemen only beat me to the punch by several hundred thousand years. Not bad, Rafferty.
There’s a woodstove back home, you see, and the house can get a bit chilly around this time of year. Yeah, there’s a furnace and thermostat and all those other non-cavemanish amenities, but what fun is that? Let’s start a fire! Yeah! Fire!
I think I might have a problem.
Anyway, with 2012 right around the corner, I figured fire was a thing I should maybe have a grasp on. We should all be working on our post-apocalyptic résumés, really. Hunting, gathering, trapping, uh, spelunking? Gang recruiters will want members with marketable skills, and if you can’t make a good barrel fire, you’re dead weight during the post-apocalypse. Probably literally.
Point is, the woodstove was calling for me. “Hey Pat… you cold? Feeling pyroish? Let’s kill these two birds with a bunch of logs.” So I ventured out to the wood pile, picked up some firewood and some kindling and brought it back inside.
Now if I only knew how to use the woodstove.
Growing up, I had seen various adult-types using the woodstove, so I had a vague notion of how it worked. Seemed easy enough. Put some firewood in the firebox, fiddle with the dampers, flue the flue thing, creosote the creosoter, then proceed to give up.
So, little known fact: a vague notion is not enough on which to operate a woodstove. Do you open the damper when you’re starting the fire, or close it? Wait, which one is the damper? What is a damper? Dampness seems like a bad idea when it comes to fire building. I was really hoping we had one of those accordion-looking blower thingamabobs (my assistant (Google) says they’re called a “bellows”), because that usually seem to do the trick in the movies. I suppose it’s possible we had one, but I threw it in the non-fire inadvertently.
Anyway, after about 20 minutes, a dozen sheets of crumpled up newspaper, two logs and a matchbook worth of matches, I gave up. Woodstove: 1, Pat: 0.
The following day I asked an adult (my mom) for help. Fire: Your parents help you put it together!
So it turns out I was doing a few things wrong. Dampers, not actually damp. And you want them open, for airflow. You want low-density, quick-burning fuel on the bottom, not the top. So newspaper on bottom, then small pieces of kindling, then bigger pieces of wood, then the accordion-looking thing on top. And the flue? Still no idea what to do with the flue. Or what it is.
Basically, everything I knew was wrong. But now I knew better. Now I knew everything. I had mastered fire. Had I ever been a boy scout, I would have ordered the fire building merit badge and sewn it on my sash. Retroactively. That counts, right?
I have no such sash, however, so instead I just built another fire everyday I was home. Sometimes I would let totally go out and then make a game of reigniting it with the ambers of the old fire.
Are you hearing this? I was making a game out of fire. Pyro.
Now that I’m back in New York, I’m a little sad that I don’t have the woodstove in my apartment. Radiators are for chumps. Back in the day, used to be you could just go out to your backyard, kick over a tree and keep your house warm for a couple months. Notsomuch anymore. Mostly because it’ll probably get you arrested.
Then again, 2012. Tree-kickers are pretty low on the police radar.
I’m gonna go buy a woodstove and kick some trees.
Bonus: Pat’s Firebuilding Tips:
1) Fire likes oxygen. So when you’re blowing on the fire, don’t blow from your lungs. Too much carbon dioxide. If you have an accordion, now is the perfect time to throw it in the fire.
2) Remember, newspaper on the bottom, then kindling, then wood on top. You can use my mnemonic “NKOTB” to help you remember this: Newspaper, Kindling On The Bottom.
3) If you don’t have any matches, I have a spare Zippo I’m not using.
4) If you find yourself in gang tryouts during the post-apocalypse, you’ll want to try and start your fire in a barrel that has some bullet holes in it (most already will). The holes allow for better airflow.
And remember:
5) Only you can prevent forest fires. Meaning you can also create them.
6) You pyro.
7) Takes one to know one.
