How To Burn a Field

(Good Advice Spurned) Grandmother packed a picnic lunch. Brother, sister, and I, with two uncles traipsed into the woods, in search of adventure. We found it. We ate our picnic lunch, sitting on a fallen tree, spanning the creek. We sampled “Rabbit Ice,” formed on weeds, hugging the stems in smooth, thin white curls. We drank creek water in cupped hands, so cold, we shivered. “Let’s build a fire,” my brother said. Uncle Larry cautioned, “You’d better not. You’ll set the field on fire.” We built the fire, warmed our cold hands. As the circle of fire began to spread, we beat it with branches, water carried from the creek in our hats. Undaunted, the fire ate up the dry grass, spreading like a pond ripple from a rock thrown in. Uncle Larry refused to join our efforts to ‘beat out’ the fire. He stood, callously laughing at our futile efforts. The entire field burned. We worried all afternoon. What would Granddad say, when he saw the black field from the kitchen window?