{"id":9634,"date":"2018-07-03T21:24:35","date_gmt":"2018-07-04T03:24:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=9634"},"modified":"2018-07-03T21:24:35","modified_gmt":"2018-07-04T03:24:35","slug":"the-element-of-fire-is-invoked-in-the-south-and-west-north-and-east","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=9634","title":{"rendered":"The Element of Fire Is Invoked in the South . . . and West, North, and East"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"

Smoke rises from the Chateau Fire in Teller County, Colorado.<\/p><\/div>\n

M. and I were driving home from Pueblo<\/a> on Monday, anxiously watching the horizon.<\/p>\n

“This reminds me of those cartoons about cavemen where there are always some volcanoes erupting in the distance,” she said, indicating the mountains with a flick of her hand.<\/p>\n

We had just passed through an area that burned on Friday-Sunday. To the north, two other forest fires were galloping through parts of Teller<\/a> and Park<\/a> counties.<\/p>\n

To the south was the biggie, the Spring Fire<\/a>, which currently has passed 79,000 acres in size (or 32,000 hectares).<\/p>\n

And now a new smoke pillar was rising in the west.<\/p>\n

An hour later, groceries unloaded, I had changed into wildland fire gear and was down at the station. This new fire was high on a mountain on national forest land, close enough to watch but nearly an hour away by truck. So we were just on standby in case in came off the mountain and towards town.<\/p>\n

The chief and another firefighter went off in a brush truck<\/a> to notify people in some subdivisions, in case they had missed the reverse-911 call. The rest of us snacked, drank water and sports drinks in the nearly 100\u00b0 F. heat, and watched the air tankers<\/a> pass overhead.<\/p>\n

My mind was all over the place. Some Old Testament lines kept popping up: “This is a burnt offering to the LORD; it is a pleasing aroma, a special gift presented to the LORD” (Exodus 29:18, if you care about these things).<\/p>\n

Yeah, but which LORD? Sky gods are supposed to like sweet-smelling offerings.<\/p>\n

Then I mentally wandered off into thinking of some kind of mad “sorcerer’s apprentice”\u00a0 ritual in which the element of fire had been invoked in all four quarters and could no longer be dismissed. That was not very comforting either.<\/p>\n

If only, as in this Danny Shanahan cartoon for The New Yorker<\/em>, they could just be a backdrop.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

M. and I were driving home from Pueblo on Monday, anxiously watching the horizon. “This reminds me of those cartoons about cavemen where there are always some volcanoes erupting in the distance,” she said, indicating the mountains with a flick of her hand. We had just passed through an area that burned on Friday-Sunday. To […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_seo_schema_type":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[211,342],"class_list":["post-9634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-fire","tag-summer"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-2vo","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1269,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1269","url_meta":{"origin":9634,"position":0},"title":"Up the Hill to Yule","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 21, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"One advantage to living in the hills is that by taking different routes, you can pick the moment of observed solstice sunrise. I could sleep in until nine o'clock and still \"drum up the sun\" if I took the trail we call \"the loop.\"But the dogs want, need, and demand\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Yule\"","block_context":{"text":"Yule","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=yule"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8287,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=8287","url_meta":{"origin":9634,"position":1},"title":"Not Dead and the House Is Still Standing","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"October 26, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"Sorry about the lack of content. Everything went topsy-turvy on the 17th and is just now returning to normal, or to a \"new normal.\" I left home on the 11th for a trip to eastern North Dakota to go grouse hunting with an old friend who himself was facing heart\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Colorado\"","block_context":{"text":"Colorado","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=colorado"},"img":{"alt_text":"william-f-schmalsle","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/10\/william-f.-schmalsle.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":591,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=591","url_meta":{"origin":9634,"position":2},"title":"A forest fire in JanuaryThe\u2026","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"January 9, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"A forest fire in JanuaryThe same winds that have pushed the grass fires in Oklahoma and Texas for the past couple of weeks have been blowing in southern Colorado too.Now a forest fire is burning west of Aguilar, just one county south of us. It is called the Mauricio Canyon\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":136,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=136","url_meta":{"origin":9634,"position":3},"title":"The comet that hit Chicago\u2026","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"March 7, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"The comet that hit Chicago On our last Amtrak layover in Chicago, last December, Mary and I walked up through the \"Miracle Mile\" shopping district and saw the ornate municipal water tower that stood alone, surrounded by desolation, after the Great Fire of 1871. Now comes a suggestion that a\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12935,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=12935","url_meta":{"origin":9634,"position":4},"title":"How Smokey Bear Would Celebrate the Summer Solstice","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"June 17, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"Flames leapt into the June sky, illuminating the attentive faces of the surroundng watchers, while waves of heat rolled off the fire. Around us was darkness, mountains, and forest. I was thirsty, so I walked over the cooler to get some water. On the way back, my boot felt loose,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"bears\"","block_context":{"text":"bears","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=bears"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/6-11-2022-fire-sm-300x225.jpeg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":9176,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=9176","url_meta":{"origin":9634,"position":5},"title":"A Fire at the Castle","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"April 2, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"It is 5:39 a.m., and the computer-generated voice on the telephone is saying, \"We need a response to Bishop's Castle \u2014 report of a structure fire.\" I pull on my jeans and scamper down to the garage. \"Structure fire\"\u2014that means bunker gear, and so on go the heavy rubber boats,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Colorado\"","block_context":{"text":"Colorado","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=colorado"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/engine-2-front-view.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9634","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9634"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9634\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9641,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9634\/revisions\/9641"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9634"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9634"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}