NONFICTION
The Catastrophic Consequences of Wildfire
by Sarah Black
The campfire was a little teepee of twigs and branches, inside a dug pit, circled by a ring of rocks. My boy studied the safety arrangements and shook his head. He had a shovel and a bucket of sand. All flammable brush had been cleared. A gallon of our drinking water was parked next to my foot.
He touched his Junior Ranger badge with one finger. I had pinned it to his fuzzy brown vest earlier and appointed him the Family Fire Marshall. He was eight, almost nine.
"We should dig a trench, Mom. That's what the firefighters do when they have to contain a wildfire."
I shook my head. "Put the shovel down, kid. It's time to cook your marshmallow." We stripped the bark from a couple of likely sticks. He moved the bucket of sand next to his camp chair.
It was autism, they eventually decided. Asperger's Syndrome. I spent a little time cruising Pub Med, reading the research. My latest theory was mercury poisoning from Chesapeake Bay crabs when I was pregnant.
I used to go to one of those seafood places in Southern Maryland, a ratty shack on pylons out in the salt marshes. The waitresses would put down brown butcher paper, then dump a big pile of steamed crabs right on to the table. Sweet tea, a salad of iceberg lettuce with thousand island dressing, a set of nut crackers and a big pile of napkins. I could still taste that sweet crab.
I stuck my marshmallow into the flames until it caught, the skin turning melty and black. I pulled it out and waved it around until the flames blew out.
"You want to taste?"
He stared at me as if I had gone insane. "No, Mom."
I stuffed it into my mouth, luscious liquid marshmallow. Oh, yum. His marshmallow was a foot from the fire.
"It's not going to get brown that way, son. Put it a little closer to the embers."
He gave me a look, half-patient and half-exasperated. "Mom, don't you understand the catastrophic consequences of wildfire? Reckless campers, Mom."
I could picture it all so clearly in my mind, especially at night. A perfect, beautifully colored strand of DNA, spinning on its end. Then the helix pulls apart, a chromosome rips, the deadly, beautiful mercury swallows some little piece, a gene, maybe just a cell. An important cell.
"I think a fire trench is a reasonable safety precaution, Mom, considering the potential consequences of a wildfire out of control."
I pulled him close. In his fuzzy brown fleece vest he was as round as a baby bear, Smokey, maybe. "You want me to help with your marshmallow?"
He nodded and gave me the stick, then retreated to stand between the shovel and the bucket of sand. I held his marshmallow carefully next to the embers.
"Here," I said, moving to where he was standing. "Pull it off, but be careful. It's hot."
He touched it to his lips. "That's sticky," he said, after he ate it. "It tastes good. You're very good at cooking marshmallows."
"Thanks, Fire Marshall. You ready to do your thing?"
He picked up the bucket of sand and marched over to douse the flames, a boy standing alone against reckless campers and the catastrophic consequences of wildfire.
Sarah Black and her son James go camping in the mountains of New Mexico. Find out more about sarah at www.sarahblack.net.