Feeling Fiery

I don’t know if it’s the color all around me, the little flames of maple leaves lying on the ground or the impending cold weather, but I am feeling fiery of late.

Our first outdoor blaze was quite delightful on Saturday, complete with good friends, delicious food and plenty of imbibing of spirits!

I’m looking in the thesaurus under “fire” and see several categories which include the expected “burning, barrage of projectiles, dismiss from responsibilities” and then what speaks to me more given my mood, but that I hadn’t really considered “animation, vigor, excite and arouse! Here I find synonyms that truly embody the fieriness to which I refer, beyond simple flame, the concepts of energy, enthusiasm, enliven, the acts of enlightening, kindling and setting aflame. The change in the weather has given me renewed energy; for life, for writing, for enjoying the world again and exploring nature. Hooray for the season of fire.

Yesterday I finished filling the wood racks and refilled the kindling bin with fallen sticks and branches from around the yard and I’m feeling ready for winter. Granted, I’m hopeful for more of the perfect days we’ve been having of late, mid 60’s, sunny and bright, but I know its inevitable that these days will gradually give way to colder, drearier days as winter is just around the corner.

Still, I am thrilled to look out my window and see the show that continues to brighten with each passing day. Despite having a bit of a cold and laying low, drinking lots of tea with lemon and honey- I hope to be back on track soon. And even being a touch ill, I can feel the fire burning in me, ready to leap into action as soon as I’m feeling better again.

Finally a Fire!

I've been wanting a fire ever since the solstice, but between being sick, cold rainy weather and high winds; the elements were against me. At last today it was cool but not cold, clear and calm, I vowed to make a fire and enjoy my change of the season, calendar flip, solar shift ritual.

An extra impetus was the tall stack of bank, credit card and retirement statements that I cleaned out of my files. I didn't trust them to the shredder- too much personal information, but their was no reason to hang on to them, it only makes me sad to see how the old retirement accounts have just gone up and down and up and down and of course lately- WAY down, fortunately I've got a few more years to recoup the losses.

I found it cathartic to burn it all up and leave it all behind. I've been having a tough time breaking out of the laziness from a week of sickness followed by the holiday mode of not getting too much accomplished and wondering where the day went- again. Hopefully having completed my fire will allow me to move forward into a more productive space.

This is our outdoor holiday tree, the only one we've had the past two years, it's a beauty. This was shot on the night scenery setting of the camera which is a slow but fun exposure. The best thing about this tree is that it's above the hammock and so I lie in the hammock and swing back and forth looking up into the lollipop colored branches.

This picture was taking while swinging.

Last I had to toast a couple of marshmallows to perfection. My special technique involves the two-pronged fork for holding the puffy pillow stationary. Once one end is toasted I pull it off, turn it around and poke it back on and toast again, then the final touch is a chunk of dark chocolate pushed inside and allowed to melt for a few seconds before popping the whole crunchy brown, sweet, melty thing in my mouth.

AWESOME! And the colors in this fire were pretty amazing as well.

I should sleep well tonight.