Fire, Again

I somehow found and turned off the alarm when it went off at 6:00 this morning. I don’t remember the 6:15 alarm. At 7:00 Daughter woke me up. “Mom, I know you didn’t get much sleep last night, but I really am sorry.” Then she burst into tears. So, of course, I had to drag myself out of bed and comfort her. She had realized that we all could have died—including the cats. “I almost burned down the house—and we don’t even own it!” Interestingly, that thought had gone through my mind, too. “They would have found our bodies and they would have wondered what caused the fire and then they would have found the lamp and hoodie and known it was my fault.” I hugged her, and assured her of my love.

It’s good she’s feeling remorse. I told her I was more upset about the extra food than the fire. I suggested she use this to motivate her to do better. This morning she was working on a poem about a guardian angel. I only remember one line: “When there is fire in a child’s eye, a guardian angel is there.”

So she went out to wait for the bus and then came running in. “Mom, come quick, you’ve got to see this.” I went to the door, lovely in my pj’s, and she pointed to the sky and said, “Fire!” Now she’s pointing straight up, so my first thought was that she was hallucinating. I dutifully followed her, and the power pole in front of the house was on fire. It’s burning and crackling away up at the top. I called 911, and they said the fire department was on the way (the mother of the boy who originally saw it had already called). I was about to tell Daughter to move away from the power lines when her bus came and picked her up.

Since the fire was right outside my bedroom, I turned off the fan in my bedroom. I didn’t want the smoke from this fire mixing with the smoke from Daughter’s fire. I decided to get dressed before the fire department showed up, because I knew that people would gather. I should have taken a shower, but I didn’t want to be in the shower when they arrived, and I didn’t want to risk losing my water half way through if the power went out. I needn’t have worried. Like clockwork, 19 minutes after we called I heard the siren.

Tiny Village doesn’t have a fire department, so we are served by the volunteer department in Less Tiny Village 9 miles from here. It always takes them 20 minutes to respond to a call. When Daughter had her first grand mal seizure (on the school bus) I got to the bus before they did. I’ve finished worship services while we’ve waited for them to arrive for a stricken parishioner. (It got us an AED—the nurses in the congregation decided it was too long to do CPR in the event of a heart attack). One truck carrying the captain and asst. chief pulled up. The captain had to finish getting dressed once they arrived. They said they could smell the fire, but couldn’t see it. I had to point it out for them. They’re stood outside watching the pole and waiting for the power company. The cross bar holding the wires burned through and was hanging, but none of the wires have broke.

I decided I’d best pick up the garbage the neighborhood cats pulled out of our trash bag since we’d be having company. One of the saints drove in from the far north end of the village (she lives about ½ a mile from here). She was frustrated she had to come herself, since the Source of All Information hadn’t called her to report or showed up to investigate yet. Even more frustrating was the fact that she was on her way to bowling, so she wouldn’t have time to brief the north end of the village. I suggested she use her cell phone.

Assistant Chief and Captain put out some orange cones to keep traffic away from the pole, and waited for the power company. Daughter called, and wanted to know if the house was still here and to make sure that Cat, Kitten and I were okay. This may underline for her the danger of putting sweatshirts over light bulbs.

When the power company finally arrived, the first thing they did was turn off the power, which was off for over 2 hours. It made for an interesting morning in the office. Over 3 hours after the fire was reported, things were finally back to normal. I hope that’s all the excitement we have in Tiny Village today.

As I could have predicted, Daughter just called in tears. She doesn't feel good and wants me to come get her. I'm sure that all of this has taken a real toll on her. It will be a rough evening, I'm sure.