Burning at the Pond

Most people refer to the seasons in a general framework – winter, spring summer, and fall. Others are more specific – hunting season, fishing season, ski – about identifying seasons. I love autumn in general, but specifically my family always got (gets) excited about the time from January 15th through April 30th – “Burning Season”!

Sure, like most folks we would rake and clean all around the house and shrubs in the early spring and burn the pile of leaves and broken branches. But for us, that was just like doing stretching exercises – it was just a warmup, spring cleaning spring training. The real game was at “The Pond”. Not to be confused with the previously blogged Urann’s Pond, “THE POND” is Maquan Pond where Grampa Mac owned 11 acres of open pine woods on the southern edge, between The Rainbow Girls camp and Cranberry Cove (Hanson’s public beach). Following a mild winter there would be enough branches that had fallen for a good weekend burning party. Following a particularly GOOD (i.e. BAD) winter there would be enough branches and whole trees downed for numerous weekends of pyromania gluttony. This was not just burning brush – this was a well produced event. First make sure Grampa got the permit, second find out what weekend was available to the largest number of relatives (most importantly the Tobin boys). Then shop for supplies – from filling the gas can to filling the cooler. Preparation activities for the designated Saturday started long before the 10:00am allowable start time posted on the permit. Gather and load the rakes, axes, shovels, buckets, chairs, blankets, gloves, coolers, etc… Drive to the pond and determine where best to light the fire (near the largest amount of blow-down, out of site from vehicles on the Camp Kiwanee Road, where it would be unlikely to spread – in that order of importance). Then we would start building the pile (envision your living room stacked to the ceiling with pine branches). Occasionally, after a really GOOD winter and with enough available helpers, we would divide into two teams, make two piles, and let the competition begin!

If mom was not bringing the littlest kids until later, we could fire it up by 9:30. Now considering the flames produced from the living room sized pine pile and the fact that we had already been working for a solid hour or more – it was break time. Stand back and admire the lighting of the Olympic torch! Have a donut and some hot chocolate from the thermos. Once the initial flames settled down into a solid steady burn, it was back to throwing more fuel to the fire. Usually we had predetermined area to clean, sometimes we would fight about whether or not someone had taken branches from the opponents turf. Always we would scold someone for not pulling their weight (measured in arm loads and frequency). This routine would continue all day until 4:00pm when the permit said to extinguish all flames. Our version of the English language interpreted this to mean don’t throw any more onto the fire after 4:00pm. As previously mentioned, we were not visible from the Kiwanee road, and Grampa Mac had once upon a time been a policeman in town, and Uncle Mac was a beloved “Townie” so we never felt too compelled to follow the letter of the law in this regard. Besides, the best portion of the day was yet to come.

By 5:00 the fire had reduced itself to a pile of bright red glowing coals and small flames about the size of loveseat. With caution, you could get close enough to cook hotdogs on a stick. Potatoes would be wrapped in foil and tossed right in to bake. These, plus chips & cookies & soda equaled supper. Once darkness fell, we settled in to chairs and blankets, with guitars and fire-poking sticks to keep us amused. By 10:00 or 11:00pm when the refreshments were gone and the fingers too cold and the embers quite well contained the last couple of fire tenders would go home.

Sunday morning was a new day, and by simply raking the ashes off the top of the pile the still glowing coals underneath would easily re-ignite with the introduction of more branches and pine needles. Pretty much Sunday was a repeat of Saturday with less prep work and an earlier closing time. No surprise that on Monday there was plenty of heat still radiating off of the ottoman sized pile of ash covered coals. The amazing part was that on Thursday the ash pile had shrunk to about the size of a toss pillow but was still warm to the touch. We never did (haven’t yet) burn down the woods as Nenna feared. This annual spring cleaning ritual was our payment to Grampa for letting us all invade and camp and swim for the summer (stay tuned for separate chapter). We burned. We camped. We swam. I don’t think us kids ever saw it all as connected - it was just another fun thing to do. It was all more fun than most kids could ever hope for.

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