Another Story

 Oh, my.  Am I ever behind in the blogging department.  I hadn't realised that it had been 10 days since I last posted and I still haven't finished documenting our August vacation.  I have good reason, though. I just returned from a trip to Halifax with baby Sarah where I witnessed the perpetual vows of my younger sister, Martha/Sr. Ilaria.  It was a very quick trip (Sat.-Tues.) but it was well worth it.  My uncle Simon from London, England came for the vows and the tiring nature of the trip was definitely paid back by the time I got to spend with this uncle.  I will post some pictures of the vows once my mom sends me her photos.  So, back to August.

One of the delights of the beach house was that we were able to have nightly bonfires at the seaside.  The first few nights my father lit these fires; but on the last, as dad had left for Romania, Dave headed down to the beach in order to set the blaze.  I don't know if there is anything so enjoyable as a bonfire for young children.  The prospect of surviving on little else than marshmallows, hotdogs and a few chips thrown in just because your Grandma says so is, well, enviable.  And, truthfully, I don't think that I have ever eaten so many roasted marshmallows at one sitting.  I believe that my dad saw it as his nightly mission to keep the nursing mother well stocked with sticky sweetness.

 At the moment I am blogging on the front porch and the lighting is causing me to see more of my reflection in the computer than the actual pictures which I have chosen.  Thus, I sure hope that you are looking at a picture of a bonfire or a potential one rather than one of me nursing (of which Hannah took many).  Back to the bonfires.  On one side of the bonfire was the real ocean and on the other side (see above picture) was a tidal pool that would fill up like a salt water lake at high tide.  What you can see is low tide.  On the last night of the vacation, when Dave lit the ill-fated bonfire, it was high tide.

 Yes, Jacob figures in this story.  Dave headed down to the beach a little early and by the time I arrived his fire was roaring ... as only a country boy with something to prove can do.  Unfortunately, the wind was also roaring.  I exited the bush and was greeted by copious amounts of smoke blowing in all directions.  (The wind in Nova Scotia has the unique ability of blowing in more than one direction.)  It was then that I remembered the sign outside of the municipal hall on the county road.  It had a little arrow pointing to various colours indicating the dryness of the surrounding countryside and thus the risk of forest fire.  Before my days living in the country I would have completely ignored this sign.  Luckily, however, I have spent the past decade in the sticks and have begun to pay attention to these signs.  There is one on the road into our town and it had been indicating a fire ban the entire summer due to the drought.  Now, I knew that there was also a drought in N.S.;  but I am so used to thinking of that province as wet that a drought there seemed laughable.

When greeted by the smoke I said, "Do you think that maybe we should put out the fire?  It seems a little windy and I think that there is a fire ban on."  (Yes, we sound extremely irresponsible.)  It was around this point that someone noticed that the large pieces of driftwood surrounding the fire and acting as benches had caught fire.  The members of my family to whom I am blood related began to both panic and laugh while Dave remained silent and cool.  Someone said, "Quick, get a bucket or something!!"

(No, Hannah did not fly a kite during the event; I just liked this picture.)  The little boys, Joe and Ben, ran back up to the house to find buckets.  They quickly arrived back at the beach with the smallest buckets possible.  They might have successfully doused a match with what they had found.  I was looking around for sand to throw on the flames; however, the beach was entirely composed of small rocks which, in the circumstances, were quite useless.  The wind kept on blowing and I began to worry that sparks would fly into the bush which was only metres away. (Oh, yes - that's why I included the above picture:  proximity of bush to fire.)  I thought, "This is how forest fires start:  idiots start them.  I didn't know we were idiots.  I had suspected that we had traces of idiocy but now I know the truth.  We finally have a vacation and now we burn down both the bush and the house.  I'm so embarrassed.  Why does everything have to end this way?..."  I tend to catastrophise.  Dave's thought process was probably more like, "There is a fire.  I will put it out.  There is no need to worry.  What is wrong with her family?"

And then there was Jacob.  Man of action.  Boy who will save the day ... or at least make an attempt.  Jacob is that particular brand of intellectual who, while possessing an inordinate amount of intelligence, tends to fall slightly short in the common sense department.  While the little boys responded to, "Quick, get something to put the fire out!!", with pathetically small buckets, Jacob took things one step farther.

He put himself on the line, sacrificing himself for the greater cause.  He remained calm, cool and collected.  He ran to the water where he plunged his head into the icy saltiness and filled his mouth with the Atlantic.  He then hurried back to the fire and emptied the contents of his mouth onto the flames.  He then repeated this process over and over again until the fire began to ... remain exactly as it was.  It was my mother who noticed Jacob's interesting attempt at volunteer firefighting.  Dave looked puzzled as he watched his firstborn and asked, "What are you doing?".  I, on the other hand, understood exactly what Jacob was doing and felt somewhat proud.  The rest of the family just looked on in pee-inducing laughter. Never before had I witnessed such a charming yet completely useless attempt to put out a fire.  His elephant-like attempts at flame dousing warmed my heart and did the same to the flames.

And that's the end of the story.  Dave, despite the family into which he has married, put out the fire.  I believe that he first cleared the area of us before he was able to make any headway.  He even checked the beach a few times before bed to make sure that all was well.  Jacob, on the other hand, felt no need to brush his teeth that night ... or for a few nights thereafter.