Fire!

“In the name of the best within you, do not sacrifice this world to those who are its worst. In the name of the values that keep you alive, do not let your vision of man be distorted by the ugly, the cowardly, the mindless in those who have never achieved his title. Do not lose your knowledge that man's proper estate is an upright posture, an intransigent mind and a step that travels unlimited roads. Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the hopeless swamps of the approximate, the not-quite, the not-yet, the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish, in lonely frustration for the life you deserved, but have never been able to reach. Check your road and the nature of your battle. The world you desired can be won, it exists, it is real, it is possible, it's yours.”

- Ayn Rand

Fire... purifier, heater, cooker of food... lighter of cigs and topic of the occasional song. As ancient as the beginning, fire is a useful tool that, like all the other elemental forces, has come to be polluted by humanity. Like all that we've misused and abused throughout our short reign here on this planet its abuse as a weapon is a reflection on our own human darkness. Fire just is, like water, earth and air. And it is here, as are we, yet it is we who are entrusted as the stewards. (Someone needs to do a better job of prescreening the applicants in the this corner of the galaxy)

Sometimes we do better at the task than at other times. Sometimes we are supremely successful and sometimes we fail... miserably. And then again... sometimes we just... exist. Getting by in mediocrity... but then sometimes we find ourselves at a pivotal point in this epic tale, this ultimate living of the legend of humanity and its primordial struggles. Sometimes I think we get a glimpse of this battle that rages within us and beyond our individual lives. The struggle of morality that a child battles when first encountering choice is the same that we as the collective entity that is humanity now face.

We are but babes spiritually. That is why the Buddhas and the Jesuses and the mother Theresases and MLKseses are like avatars... because that fire that sparked their ascensions burns but rarely and when it burns... it burns bright amid our collective darkness. And the way I see it... these are really dark times. Genghis Khan and his hordes had no corner on the atrocities market...

Of course what all that has to do with the pictures I'm posting is a little fuzzy... I think it was that quote from Ayn Rand that did it, more proof that ideas are dangerous and I'm soooo glad my government is increasingly seeing fit to protect us all from such danger...

Anyway... I had the opportunity to catch an intentional burn in the West Eugene wetlands earlier this week. Pretty cool. Well... acually pretty darn hot. "Cool" is just one of those words we used to use when I was young. And young was light ages ago, as my son keeps pointing out... So here ya go, some hot pics that are pretty cool: