gretchenwrites.com

kindle, kindling

v – to arouse or inspire; to light or set on fire; to give birth

On a solo visit to our lake house last fall, I laid wood for a fire in our firepit before I left for a boat ride. When I returned home and docked the boat, it was nearly dark. A family of deer was grazing in the yard, so I sat for a few minutes watching them eat before I realized it was completely dark and I could no longer see them, or much at all in front of me. I carefully got out of the boat, and shuffled my way across the dock and up the stairs to the firepit. I used the flashlight on my phone to locate the lighter I’d brought down earlier and began lighting the kindling I’d placed in and around the edge of the base of the wood pile.

After just a few minutes, the kindling did it’s job and the firewood caught and started to burn; before long, the fire was warming the air around me. Over the next few hours, I sat by the fire, stoking it and feeding dry logs in from time to time, poking and shifting the positions of the logs so they’d burn more evenly. I admired the stars and watched the way the light and flames danced and rose and disappeared into the night.

I reveled in my aloneness, in the quiet that held me and the space that unfolded to make room for reflections and words and thoughts to bloom.

And it’s in that spirit that I enter this little corner of the internet, hoping that this blog will be both the kindling and the space for my writing to grow.

Thanks for joining me here.