Hungry Michiganders
A match, curiosity, & hunger.
Igniting a fire in the cabin stove requires a single match, but success demands diligence.
I started days before collecting the forest drops protruding from the periwinkle. Twigs, branches, entire limbs bundled to the stove door where I snapped them into lengths short enough to fully enter the firebox. A few days out of the damp crisped them for a fire on a wet and weeping Wednesday when I crumpled a week’s worth of news and tucked it under the twigs, crammed it full in the corners, left ragged edges underneath. I pressed my fingers between the sticks like dexterous forks to open air channels before placing the birch logs atop the pyre, making sure they would not roll.
When I snapped the matchhead across the rough side of the box the chemicals exploded into a flame that lit the paper edges. The draft inhaled around the partially shut glass door and began the roar of yesterday’s news until the twigs began to pop and glow. Flame licked around the birch bark that curled into tightening black coils until they disintegrated into a puff of ash.
The fire died down, threatened to extinguish. I cracked the door to wheeze on the coals that brightened for an instant at each breath. The surrender of white smoke tendrils spiraled up the flue, warned the fire could fail. I wielded the fire poker like a conductor’s baton to spin and rearrange the logs to increase the heat. Five minutes of melody more and the fire caught for good, if I could keep it fed.
Within the hour my guests trudged the Ridges, soaked in nature, melded with the mist, and built an appetite from the damp. Their curiosity questioned ghost house ruins, secret ingredients, and a published book’s timeline. Over cocktails their hunger intensified like first flames, then flickered in the steady warmth of fresh asiago bread dipped in stew, only to subside and cool with a slice of blackberry custard pie (maybe a slice and a half).
A match.
Curiosity.
Hunger.
They were one. Our catalysts to conversation tripped merrily past twilight into the wet flat ink of night that surprised us with its darkness when we left the warm glow of cabin firelight.
