After some downtime of petting the neighboring horses after we returned from Jefferson National State Area, I decided to clean the owner’s patio where the fire pit is. It wasn’t something anyone told me to do, but it was not an environment that I thought I could enjoy. There was a lot of built up dirt, leaves, branches and twigs in corners and along the edges of the walls. The chairs intended for the area were placed haphazardly and there were stray objects not tucked away anywhere. All her potted plants were also dead, as expected in the winter, but they weren’t pruned so their dead limbs just hung outside the pots crusty, brown, and sad. It looked unkept, and I knew that I wouldn’t enjoy having fires in the pit unless my surroundings matched my spirit of tidiness and sightliness. This led me to pick up the push broom, find the shovel (already on the patio) and investigate how to pull the blue wheelbarrow down from the hill that I could see it on. After a few hours, I was done! I wish I had taken a before / after picture, but you’ll just have to suffice with the after photo. I built the structure of the fire while there was still sunlight. Will and I cooked hot and sour soup together, his classic recipe. The kitchen is definitely a two butt kitchen, and nothing more. The soup turned out totally delicious and I was tempted to have seconds! Once we were finished cleaning up, we lit the fire. It wasn’t very chilly, but not warm either. The stars sparkled in the sky. There were no dusty clouds shadowing the moon. Our moments were filled with the crisp scent of mountain air, crackling and sputtering noises of the logs, lichen, and newspaper burning, and the stars set in the sky like a globe around us.
See here, the Vagabond For Honey 