NOTHING TO IT

Dear Spike:

I leave tomorrow for southern Utah, where a wildfire twice the size of New York City has made a living hell of this Earth.

I’m a bit wary of this trip. I’m still not sure I’ve recovered, entirely, from our two-week sojourn across the western United States. It was a bear of a drive and I’m still a bit worn out, but I will never forget the weeks that you, your mother and I shared on the road.

You were absolutely remarkable. Quiet and content (well, mostly anyhow) you spent more than 40 hours strapped into your car seat like a tiny little lunatic in our tiny little asylum, as we drove fro Salt Lake City to Boise and from Boise to Bend. From Bend to Portland to Salem and back to Portland again. From Portland to Corvallis to Eugene to San Francisco. From San Francisco to Salt Lake City.

In some 2,500 miles, we crossed mountain ranges and deserts. We saw the Pacific Ocean and traveled through the Redwood Forest. We saw the San Francisco Bay and passed twice through the 45th Parallel — the halfway point between the equator and the North Pole.

You met, for the first time, your maternal grandparents and great-grandmother, your paternal great grandparents, four aunts, six uncles, your God mother and an admiring public so vast that its members could fill every seat in Fenway Park.

And for the first time, you smiled — a toothless, gummy, open-mawed grin on the front steps of the home where I grew up.

You weren’t the only one smiling. Our family spent just about every waking moment together. And I never grew tired of it.

You might think, after spending just about every minute of the past two weeks together, a night or two away from home wouldn’t be such a big deal. I’ve done this plenty of times before, after all.

It’s a routine assignment. I’ll pack up early Saturday morning and be at the fire by lunchtime. Two or three hours later, I’ll file my first report. Two or three hours more and I’ll have sent another. By late Saturday night my head and clothes will be thick with smoke. And I will fall asleep on my hotel bed without so much as taking off my boots.

On Sunday, God willing, I’ll be writing this blaze’s obituary. And then I’ll turn my car north and come home.

Nothing to it.

Except, of course, that this will be my first trip away from you and your mother since you were born. You’re growing so fast. You’re doing so much. I fear I’ll miss something while I’m gone.

And I know I will miss you, and your mother, very much.

Love,
dad