Vagueness and the Aftermath - A sporadic diary

[RED-DOG]

I believe that somewhere in our subconscious, there is a deeply embedded force that bonds mankind to fire. Even the most modern, sophisticated man, with his centrally heated home and air conditioned office building, is only separated from his primal instincts by the thin veneer of civilisation. His fascination for the open flame, like the seed of a flower in winter, lies dormant and invisible just below the surface. In most cases, he won’t even know it’s there, but nurture it a little, and it will burst forth with astonishing alacrity, leaving the beholder forever smitten by its beauty.

The fire has been, until very recently, the pivot around which Gypsy culture revolved. The women cooked on it, and they heated water for washing and cleaning.  The men would come home after hard days work and sit and warm themselves as they ate their evening meal. Then they would take out their peg knives and whittle wooden clothes pegs and elder flowers for the womenfolk to hawk the next day. As they worked, they would talk in low voices. Recounting events of the day, or of days gone by. Always, there would be small boys, sitting quietly lest they attract attention or appear brazen. Little did they know it, but these boys were at school, drinking in knowledge and wisdom hard won by their elders. As they stared into the embers, the code and culture of their ancestors leeched into their soul.


I know that this hasn’t got much to do with fire lighting, and even less to do with lighting a coke fire. But I felt I needed to point out the significance of the fire to me personally before moving on to the actual mechanics of getting one going.

[RED-DOG]

Lighting a coke fire in a small stove such as you would find in a caravan is sort of a cross between an art and a ritual. It’s not rocket science, but you do have to be patient and methodical. If it doesn’t catch first time, subsequent attempts are infinitely more difficult and complicated.

I must have lit the fire thousands of times during my lifetime, but now my old caravan has been sold, and the replacement will have gas central heating. I may never do it again. So, for prosperity, here is a typical scenario.

You wake up in bed. You are deliciously warm and snug; the bedclothes are tucked under your feet and pulled over your head. Save for a tiny breathing hole, you are completely insulated from the outside world.

Although it’s pitch black under the covers, you can tell it’s time to get up because the birds are singing. You test the outside temperature by allowing an exploratory hand to slip briefly from your cocoon and are rewarded by an influx of freezing cold air. You retreat quickly, but you know that you are only delaying the inevitable.

You throw back the covers, and the cold hits you like an electric shock. There is ice on the inside of the windows, and your breath forms frosty white clouds in the biting air. You are moving quickly now, shivering your way into clothes that have somehow achieved the impossible and become colder than their surroundings. 

Before you open the door of the stove, you insert a small lever called a riddler into a socket on the side and agitate it backwards and forwards, this causes yesterday’s cold ash to fall through the grate and into the ash-pan below. Then, after allowing a minute or two for the dust to settle, you open the door and remove the ash-pan using the specialised attachment on the other end of the riddler. The ashes are then discarded and the ash-pan replaced.

Next you separate and crumple about 10 sheets of newspaper, and lay them on the grate. Crumple them too tightly and they won’t burn, too loose, and they burn too quickly,

On top of the paper you place a good bundle of dry sticks that you chopped the day before using an axe called a billhook. This is a small double-sided axe with a blade shaped like a parrot’s beak. As you place the sticks, you take care to arrange them in such a way that they will allow air to flow freely and also prevent the weight of the coke from crushing the paper.

Finally, you add as much coke as you can without compressing the kindling below, light the paper, close the door of the stove, set the damper to the fully open position, put the kettle on and wait.

You can’t usually see if the fire is burning, Even if the glass panel in the door of the stove has not yet been broken and replaced by a sheet of metal. Because within a minute or so of lighting, it is rendered useless by a thick coat of soot which ironically, burns off again as soon as the fire is roaring properly.

So you listen, and if you have done your job properly, you are rewarded by the crack and sigh of burning wood. Soft and spasmodic at first, you strain forward to hear it, but soon the air is filled with the unmistakable popping and spitting of a fire that has taken hold, already you can feel its warmth radiating through the steel, you sit back with your tea and relax.

If, on the other hand, you have become complacent and neglected to take due care during one or other part of the fire lighting process, then the spitting and popping will begun to fade before the coke is properly alight, and your fire will go out.

If it does, you can guarantee that it will happen on a mind numbingly cold day such as this. It will happen when you’re late for something, or it will happen when you are ill.

Now, you have to re- light it. This is much worse than lighting it in the first place. Although it’s not alight, everything is red hot and smouldering. You open the stove door and smoke billows out, making your eyes smart and your clothes stink. While the rest of you trembles in the freezing cold, your hands are burned repeatedly as you try to scrape out the hot embers so that you can try again. You will then find that you have no more paper, or no more wood, or the wood will be wet, etc, etc.

I’m sure that most of you found all this incredibly boring, but as someone else on here once said, it’s my diary, I’ll write what I like.

Somewhere in there are one or two of “Life’s excellent lessons” that Tony wants to talk about; I’ll leave him to explain what they are,

[amcgrath1uk]

i think i speak for the majority of blondes in saying we take a vested interest in what you have to say. Some of your life experiences are things we either take for granted, never thought of doing, never heard of or have no need to do. The way you put this makes us want to read more and learn more!!

LONG MAY THE DIARY CONTINUE!

[Tractor]

I  used to love lighting fires as a kid......
But then again im a cotswold farmer/hillbiliie i suppose very similar to Tom but not, in many ways.

[Tonji]

LONG MAY THE DIARY CONTINUE!

 

[JungleCat03]

I love your diary tom. It's earthy realism with a warm, homely quality to it, all effortlessly expressed. Very much llike Bill Bryson.

You may have a dodgy moustache but your writing is excellent and as many have said you should definitely write a book.

Keep it up! 

[The_duke]

That story was so true of a lot of fire starts at home -- I am now so nostalgic I need another drink - cheers 

[Card_Shark]

Fire lighting boring, never, i still light fire's regularly in my chiminera in the garden whenever we have a party here LOL.

[RioRodent]

A regular job when I was a boy, was folding firelighters from the newspapers -



Suprisingly I couldn't find a picture on Google/Images, so had to go and fold one!! 

And the ice on the inside of the bedroom windows certainly brings back memories also.

Keep up the good work Tom!

[madasahatstand]

Red

I was out walking today and when I came across this I thought about your fire lighting. Its a pity you aint going to be doing it anymore because I spotted this stash and further down the road someone had taken the time to chop some up to fire size:)  I love real fires and we had one when I was growing up. Im a dab hand at lighting fires too and I know what you mean about not getting it right first time...soul destroying but when it finally lights there is a glow of self satisfaction:)

[RED-DOG]

That looks like pine Mad.

Pine is a bugger to light and it spits like a wildcat, but it smells wonderful.

[madasahatstand]

That looks like pine Mad.

Pine is a bugger to light and it spits like a wildcat, but it smells wonderful.

Correct it's pine:) The spitting and hissing are fun and I agree, it smells great:) I dont think I've ever used it to like a fire though but I might have half inched a few logs to keep a fire going 

[RED-DOG]

A regular job when I was a boy, was folding firelighters from the newspapers -



Suprisingly I couldn't find a picture on Google/Images, so had to go and fold one!! 

And the ice on the inside of the bedroom windows certainly brings back memories also.

Keep up the good work Tom!

Wow Rio, you should send that pic to google, then they would have a stock photo.

[madasahatstand]

A regular job when I was a boy, was folding firelighters from the newspapers -



Suprisingly I couldn't find a picture on Google/Images, so had to go and fold one!! 

And the ice on the inside of the bedroom windows certainly brings back memories also.

Keep up the good work Tom!

Superb job:)

[RED-DOG]

By the way salad dodgers, my week 1 weigh-in is only 2 days away.

I will be satisfied with a loss of 2lbs, happy with 3lbs, and ecstatic with 4lbs.

Am I nervous?   Hell Yes!!!