The elixir of flame

By Kelly Price
Reader Contributor

I once struck up a conversation with a vintage woman who was hobbling along a sidewalk with her cane. Her mind seemed sharp, her vocabulary rich and I sensed I’d happened upon a rare jewel. As we talked, I referenced something from a TV show, to which she responded with a quick, bright curveball.

“Oh, I don’t have a TV, nor do I want one,” she announced. “I have a fireplace!” 

This little zinger amused me at the time; yet, many years later, the epic simplicity of her apples-to-oranges comparison still resonates. What once struck me as quaint has now become wise in ways I could never have foreseen.

With the world changing at such a rapid pace, many of us understand the necessity of staying informed on a regular basis. Way too often, however, we peer into our phone screen or tablet and get fire-hosed with an alarming number of fresh atrocities – to the degree that we feel off-kilter or even mauled by the latest happenings. Each competing platform seems to be in a race to the bottom of the brainstem where outrage lies, simmering like lava.

Even if our algorithms take us for a scroll-athon through pleasant scenes and memes, when we finally surface, we are sapped and colorless. Like the porch light is on but nobody’s home. In this zombified era, the digital hivemind hum drowns out the sound of our own heartbeat. 

I gotta say, each day of living supplies me with mounting evidence that what that sassy old lady said many years ago holds some valuable meaning today. Though the act of ditching my phone and swaddling myself like a potato bug in a quilt is tempting, it’s now clearer than ever that balance is crucial. 

We all have our methods of soothing the jumble of crags that mount on our foreheads, but the one I’m recently addicted to is fire gazing – a literal balm that soothes the savage beast and opens a portal to calm introspection. Nothing holds a candle to the sense of well-being that washes through me while gazing into a contained fire.

In our household, the primary source of heat is a wood stove, so we keep it stoked and blazing most of our waking winter hours. Like many woodstoves, ours hosts a wide glass window through which we can rest our eyes on the ever-evolving firescape. Winter in Upstate Idaho would feel somewhat desolate without this small but potent box of wildly undulating light. It animates the household when all else outside is swaddled in still, snowy dormancy.

Legions of poets and writers agree: Fire is mesmerizing and hypnotic. It can open the way to meditative states, allowing access to what we really think, feel or believe. It’s a focused relaxation tool that allows the flow-glow to call out the truth in one’s heart. Fire can be a great mind emptier, with phenomenal powers to usher in a sweet void, making space for a deep, soulful rest or opening a route to new perspectives. Since it offers nothing prerecorded or rehearsed, each fire offers a threshold to pass through and plunge into the heart of each arriving moment. Here, we marvel at the majesty of beauty creating itself anew. 

At the same time, we’re provided with a throughline – a connecting conduit that completes the circuit between us, our ancestors and all who came before us. Fire tells timeless stories written in a universal language. We read, turn the pages with a poker and see the narrative change as the logs resettle. 

Entertainment-wise, each fire is a live improv dance, where the primary performers are ecstatic, translucent dervishes. Each show is a one-off, unrepeatable creation. The choreography and special effects are always fresh, fizzing out sprinkle-sparks, pops, cracks and sizzles when least expected.

Slender flames pipe up like staccato notes being emitted from elven calliopes. Tangerine, marigold and amber dominate the dervishes’ costumes while sapphire, indigo and violet shoot up through their roots and feet. The general dominance of warm colors can be tempered with touches of coolness as if it contains a whisper of ocean or sky twisting through their upward spiral. A badass riff of death metal flame can gradually smooth into molten waves of sensual jazz. Each sinew is supple, flexible, acrobatic or spastic, yet elegant as a corps de ballet or highly disciplined violinist. Tangible, yet transient, I see liquid Arabian sabers thrash against the dark brick backdrop of the woodstove. The whole vibe created is utterly soothing, seducing one into a profound realm of possibility – and possibility is what this is all about. 

It’s becoming more vital to find an hour or so each day to receive the healing gifts Nature offers. She shows us beauty, which makes tangible a sense of hope and possibility. It allows us to hear our own narratives and strengthens our resolve to affect change where we can in the world. 

So light some candles, spark up the hibachi or firepit, and find a few extended moments to bathe in the glow. Almost inevitably, it will offer an elixir that opens the soul, mind and heart in the best possible way, wordlessly reminding us that, as poet Arthur O’Shaughnessy wrote and Roald Dahl quoted, “We are the music makers/ And we are the dreamers of the dreams.”