Some of my favorite childhood moments are held safe within snapshot memories of family camping trips to the Adirondack mountains. Although those trips ended by the time I was ten years old, 45 or so years later, the importance of those moments still resonates.
The author’s then teenaged father and other ancestors gathered around an Adirondack campfire [courtesy Ray Barker Sr.]
My mother was the central figure in my life in those days, but in the mountains where he spent much of his childhood, my father shone as bright as a star to me. I marveled at his knowledge of the forest and its inhabitants, his woodlore, and his skill at setting up neat, well-organized campsites, and I was fascinated by his command of fire.
We did not have a fireplace in our home, and my mother was not into burning candles. Camp was the first place I experienced the comfort and living power of fire, and there was my dad, effortlessly able to control it.
He knew how to build a perfect campfire, could keep it going through rounds of campfire songs and marshmallow toasting, and then carefully bank the fire so he could quickly start it again in the morning. With one exception, there was never a time when the last fire on the last day was not made from the first fire on the first day.
At that time, I thought he had some magical secret, and I suppose, in a way, he did. Although I am sure he never considered it to be magic, his secret was deeply rooted in knowing and understanding the nature of the element with which he was working. His power lay in the practical application of basic science and intuition. That was part of the woodlore he learned from his father, an avid woodsman who grew up in those mountains and passed his skills and knowledge to his son, who passed them to his children as they were interested.
Forged in Fire – a blacksmith in the process of tending coals [courtesy Bill Rhodes]
As I planned my immersive study of the elements last September, I frequently thought about my father and the knowledge he had shared with me on those camping trips. That introduction to woodlore fueled my interest in the elements from a practical perspective. It was also when I first became aware of the profound presence that existed beyond the physical aspect of fire. I did not have the life experience or vocabulary to name it, but I knew it was something alive and real even if I could not see it. I instinctively knew that if the element of fire had such a presence that other elements would, too. That awareness eventually set me on the path to seeking a connection with the elemental energies and ultimately to building a relationship with them. And here I am, all those years later, still engaged in that pursuit.
At first, my study plan seemed out of order: water, earth, air, fire. I usually begin north (earth) or air (east) when I start something new, but I realized that saving fire until last meant I would spend the month leading up to Imbolc exploring and immersed in Brigid’s element. Perfect timing.
Because this is not my first work with elemental fire, I am familiar with its use as a powerful force for transformation and creation. I understand the nature of the elemental just as I understand the science behind the physical, just as I understand my own nature. Many aspects of elemental fire can bring about ruin. However, tended and used carefully and mindfully as my father taught me so many years ago, it can provide warmth and comfort. It can also serve to strengthen that which is exposed to it, as is done in the process of repeatedly folding steel over the coals of a forge in order to create a sword.
During times past when my emotions were raw, I wielded the destructive potential of fire simply by allowing anger, passion, and will to burn uncontrolled within and around me. There was always a cost for doing so. There was always collateral damage and damage to me.
This time of year can be difficult as I move through winter’s darkness to the day that marks the passing of my youngest daughter and, beyond that, to Imbolc. Hoping to avoid the potential for damage, I used this immersive period to connect with specific aspects of elemental fire to make my way along a difficult path.
On the first day, I sat for a short time in a candle flame meditation, reaching out quietly to the elemental, relaying my intentions. I carefully fed our connection by feeding words into the flame like sticks into a campfire. Focus. Balance. Purpose. Will. Insight. When I finished the meditation I smoored the candle and, with intention, set it aside.
Elemental Fire – a lick of flame dances above a brazier [courtesy Bill Rhodes]
I continued this gentle process, gradually lengthening the meditation. Each day I continued to feed words to the flame. Eventually, I heard whispers as elemental fire gifted those words back to me. Each evening as night settled around my home, I would take that smoored candle and use it to light other candles in the dining room, on the mantle in the living room, in my bedroom, on my healing altar, and at my desk. I have long enjoyed using candles during the winter months to create a softness of light that I find cozy and pleasing. Now they also cast a softness of energy throughout my home as the flames whisper the words that are smoored into the candles, holding at bay the darkness from without and within.
Encouraged by this result, I began other avenues of exploration. The juxtaposition of the qualities of stillness of meditation with the perpetual movement of fire intrigued me. When I eventually focused the energy created by this juxtaposition through the image of a keyhole, it brought about intriguing levels of astral travel to new-to-me planes and places.
I did not set about this course of study of elemental fire to achieve any type of transformation, but it seems to have happened in spite of me. At a time of year when grief and PTSD have historically kept me on the edge of fight-or-flight, I have been calmer and felt more balanced. The energy in my home feels calmer and more balanced, even with the unexpected addition of a 12-week-old puppy to the family. I am almost through the hardest day of each year, and this year I can almost believe I will make it.
I am grateful that my father went beyond his comfortable boundaries and taught a little girl things that he believed only boy scouts and woodsmen should know. Those early life experiences provided some of my first lessons in how magic is present in even seemingly mundane, everyday things.
One final note about the blemish on my father’s campfire record: the damage was done by a four-year-old boy who decided to play fireman instead of walking to the campground bathroom. Water trumps fire, almost every time.
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