On an ordinary Saturday, I was working at the kitchen sink loading the dishwasher. The window above the sink looked toward the backyard and included a good view of our detached garage. In the middle of my chore, I glanced out the window and noticed a column of smoke rising between the garage and our next-door neighbor’s wooden fence. It was so tall that is rose above the garage roof. Thankful that Brian was home, I brought his attention to it. He went out and dealt with the fire and had a stern conversation with our sons. When he came in the kitchen to give me the report, he said that they had burned something in the bottom of the brown plastic garbage can. It now had a hole in it, but nothing else was damaged and more important, no one was hurt. We went about our day.
Monday was garbage day. Living in a small town, and being at home so much, we were acquainted with our garbage man. It was not uncommon for the children to be playing in the front yard when the truck arrived. The garbage man knew we had two young boys in our family. When the truck pulled up to collect our garbage, I watched from the front room window. He emptied the first can. After dumping the second can, the brown plastic one, he paused and looked curiously into the can and its holey bottom. He shook his head and smiled.
This was the phase when our boys had a keen fascination with fire. Because we heated our home with a wood pellet stove, they were familiar enough to know fire’s basic properties and dangers, or so we thought. To help them learn to be safe with fire, sometimes we allowed them to have a small fire in our garden spot behind the garage. With a dirt ground and water nearby, we deemed this reasonably safe as long as the boys were supervised.
Shortly after the garbage-can incident, on another weekend day at home Ben wanted a little fire. Brian helped him build it about three or four feet away from the metal wire back fence in the garden. We took turns supervising Ben, sitting under our shady maple tree. When it was my turn, I took a magazine and got comfortable in a lawn chair. I noticed that Ben was poking a stick around in the fire. I reminded him to keep the stick in the fire. The next moment I looked up, about five or six feet of dry grass was burning along the back fence. I jumped up, grabbed a shovel that had been left out in the garden (thank God), and with several shovelfuls of dirt, I put out the fire. Of course, Ben watched all of this. When I was finished smothering the fire, I was shaking. If the fire had continued down the back fence and made contact with our neighbor’s dry, wooden fence, it could have gotten out of hand very quickly.
I did not trust my emotions and told Ben to go to his room. By this point Brian had come out to the backyard, and I relayed what happened. We agreed that Brian would talk with Ben in his room. I stayed put in the shade, calming down. After a short while, Ben came out to me. He was in tears and terribly contrite. He apologized, and I forgave him. He said that he had no idea the fire would take off so quickly. With my arms around him, we talked about the nature of fire. He learned a valuable lesson that day. We never had another fire incident with any of the children.
I share these stories to illustrate that spending time outdoors is necessary for children to learn to assess risk. They gauge risk while climbing trees, catching critters, and riding their bicycles, to give a few tamer examples. Yes, fire is dangerous, and we thanked God for his protection in these situations and throughout our children’s childhoods. I expect He spared them from injuries and illnesses that we were never aware of. Most dangerous tools have benefits; that’s why we need and use them. Yes, the fire examples are a bit alarming. But we heated our home with fire and built campfires while camping. When the boys were older, they could be trusted to manage the campfires at Boy Scout campouts. They learned how to respect and use fire safely. To shelter children from learning to use tools properly, even fire, is to limit their knowledge and skills.
I leave you with a photo of several cactus with a deceptive name. After its soft, fuzzy appearance, it is called the Teddy Bear Cholla. But do not make the mistake of petting it; you will get a handful of painful spines.