Pinch me, I’m dreaming

Work in Progress by Ivan Morgan

I have never been one for luxury. Others love fine food, fine wines, fancy cars, and the other finer things in life. More power to them. It’s just never been my cup of tea.

In fact, take tea for an example. There’s no end of fancy teas on the market, but I am happy with a mug of good old Tetley. I have tried many fancy teas, but for me the real treat is a nice cuppa after a long walk.

The ultimate luxury, for me, and one I have learned I cannot live without, is wood heat. I have a great passion for fire. Its more than warmth for me, it fills some spiritual need I have.

In my last house (where I raised my children) I had a wood stove. I lived outside of town, and my house bordered hundreds of acres of woods owned by the local parish. The first thing I did when I installed my woodstove was write them and ask permission to cut a cord or two of wood every year from their property. Never a live tree, I cautioned, only deadwood, which I would carry out on my back. No machine would damage their forest. Just my footprints. In fact, no damage at all. After careful consideration, being Christians, they naturally said no.

A friend who was a member of the parish laughed when I told him. He told me they say no to almost every request. His advice was to go ahead and cut and carry out the wood, they’ll never check. Sage advice. For almost 20 years I did that every winter, hauling a few cords out for my woodstove. If a tree blew down in a storm, it was mine. It was great exercise, better than a gym membership. Basically, I tidied their forest for them. Now it’s a huge subdivision.

I once saw an ad for a propane “fireplace” which promised none of the fuss or mess of an old-fashioned one. I liked the fuss and the mess. I liked cutting, chopping, and stacking my wood to dry over the summer. I loved carrying it into the house and stacking it by the stove, especially when a big blizzard was coming.

I loved toasting myself by the fire on a cold winter’s night. I have happy memories of sleeping through some of the most expensive movies Hollywood could concoct. On a Friday night, after a hard week, I’d curl up by the woodstove with a good movie and . . .zzzzz.

I live in town now. I have a fireplace. I don’t cut my own firewood anymore (although I should). I have a relative who buys it for me as a birthday present. She once said she thought firewood was a silly birthday present. I told her she wasn’t buying me firewood; she was buying me untold happy hours sitting by a roaring fire with a good book. She allowed that made it sound better (I didn’t work in politics for over a decade without a little of it rubbing off on me).

I love a beach fire, a boil up in the woods, anything where I can warm myself by open flame. Ever since I was old enough to gaff matches from my parents, I have been lighting fires in the woods. Not setting fire to the woods (well, there was that one incident, but it was an accident), but building a firepit with rocks and roasting hot dogs.

I have absolutely no scientific evidence for this, but I believe fire is in our DNA. For hundreds of thousands of years, humans lived in small groups in the forest, crowding around a fire at night, using it to roast their food, keep themselves warm and safe from other animals. I think it is in our makeup.

We aren’t that long out of the primeval forest. There is something very basic about our attraction to the heat and light of a crackling fire.

I have friends who dream of Caribbean beaches, four-star restaurants in New York City, or expensive penthouse apartments in Toronto. I have been there and done that, and it was very nice. But at my time in life, I my idea of luxury is a new book and a fresh cup of tea in front of a warm fire.

Pinch me.

Ivan Morgan can be reached at ivan.morgan@gmail.com