Whenever it rains. In Michigan, it rains half the year. Then there are the
months of snow that piles up and melts, but has nowhere to go when the ground
is frozen. When it’s not raining, the sun beats down through a haze of humidity
that singes the landscaping, turns the grass brown, and skin sticks to itself and
everything it touches. I long for the cold, wet days of fall and early spring, but
they are momentary. The weather is unpredictable and inconsistent. It’s often
moody and violent, and when the sky cracks open, nothing—nobody—is safe.
Afterward, I walked the perimeter of my house looking for areas that water could
puddle during rainstorms. It didn’t matter that the water had actually risen up
through the drain pipes in the basement floor because of a failed city sewer
system, underground aqueducts with missing copper pipes that had been stolen
and sold for scrap. At night, thunder jolted me awake anyway, and I listened to
the rain against the roof, scratching at the windows, always anticipating another
invasive act of God.
The remains of a fire would loiter: the ash and soot coating everything
in its path as it spread for miles, depending on weather and wind speed,
the charred remains of the damaged structure would seep into the ground,
damaging the soil. The smell would burrow in so deeply that anything untouched
by flames would be damaged anyway. The aftermath of a fire was infinite; at
least water eventually receded, though recovery wasn’t a guarantee.
“At least with a fire, there’s closure,” he continued.
I nodded, though I didn’t agree. I didn’t want to get into a discussion with
this coworker in which we ranked from bad to awful the severities of loss and
suffering. I didn’t need closure. I just wanted to go home and clean out my
basement.
There are two things that I do with wood: cut it and assemble it into
something purposeful, or I burn it. In the dark, discarded wood catches heat in
a fire pit on the corner of my backyard patio. As the flames die down, I toss in
cardboard boxes, unwanted circulars, and junk mail. There is more smoke than
fire, though I don’t bother to change seats or adjust the smoldering stack. My
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