By Micki Bare
Fire pit weather is upon us. Warm, sunny days followed by crisp, clear nights make autumn one of my favorite seasons. Sitting outside around our fire-pit table after a long week lifts my spirits and warms my soul.
Add to the crackling embers some sparkling stars against a dark blue sky and a slice or five of homemade pizza, and the stress of the week slips away into the shadows. Yes, the stress will jump back out come Monday morning and cling to my back like a large, frightened monkey. But as I stare into the dancing flames considering a sixth slice of pizza, I briefly forget that back-clinging stress monkeys exist.
The fire pit is magical. Not only does it burn away day-to-day worries, but it also has a magnet effect on the family. The boys are drawn to the open flame, causing them to spend time with us. For teens, the fire pit is able to transform otherwise lame, hard-headed, despicable parental figures into bearable adults.
My teens might be busily going about their weekend business — hanging out with friends, listening to music with indistinguishable lyrics, complaining about the lack of meat toppings available for the homemade pizza — but they always pause at the fire-pit table if flames are present.
The fire pit also sparks ingenuity. My youngest teen cannot sit by an open flame without toasting a marshmallow. Now that we’ve moved into town, the only stick he could find was a thick branch leftover from the last sickly tree we had to take down. It required lots of whittling to pare it down to the appropriate thickness as well as taper the end into a marshmallow-worthy point.
Whittling skills don’t exactly run in our family. This is a disability common among those with Northeastern roots. And while my boys may have been born in the South and are half-Southern by virtue of their daddy’s side, I must shamefully admit that I never exposed them to many activities that included the use of wood and a pocket knife.
In my defense, I am an overprotective mother who fears the worst, especially when it comes to fingers and sharp knives. Then again, the only person in our household who ever needed stitches after an unfortunate finger-knife incident was me.
Whittling deficiencies aside, my son didn’t have the patience required to alter the stick.
While I was questioning his utensil choice, he was opening a fresh bag of marshmallows with the intent of sticking one on the end of his dirty, bark covered, frayed branch.
Suddenly, my son froze in mid-marshmallow stab. We looked at each other and smiled. Our heads were illuminated by the glow of the light bulbs that had just clicked on. We had an idea: skewers.
All summer long, we stabbed plump shrimp, chunks of beef and various vegetables with skewers for grilling. Adhered to the end of a raggedy stick with duct tape, a skewer would make the perfect marshmallow toasting utensil for our fire pit.
It was a great idea that seemingly came out of nowhere. But we knew better. It was the magic of the burning fire pit that inspired exceptional inventiveness in minds otherwise weary from a long week.
After repeatedly testing our brilliant invention, my son and I developed some tips, or rather warnings, should the public decide to replicate — at its own risk — our marshmallow toasting device.
The skewer-enhanced stick should never be used by anyone under the age of 13 or people in bad moods. Misuse of this device can cause bodily harm. A skewer is much pointier than a whittled stick and can do a lot more damage upon accidental human impact.
No preheating of the skewer is necessary. Unlike the whittled end of a wooden stick that burns and crumbles if held in the fire for awhile, a skewer will simply become red hot. Placing a cold marshmallow on a burning hot skewer can cause serious burns to fingers.
Yes, it makes a really cool sizzle sound when the marshmallow contacts the skewer. And yes, neat puffs of smoke are emitted from the internally burning marshmallow. However, assuming you have not branded a finger or two while loading, as soon as you begin toasting, the internally melted marshmallow will slip off the skewer and land in the fire pit.
The burning lump of marshmallow will take on a lava-like existence as its bubbly, charred remains spread over a physics-defyingly large area of the pit. However, there are safer ways to emulate lava, such as simply dropping three stale, fused-together marshmallows into the fire.
Clearly we had a relaxing autumn evening of family and marshmallow bonding around our mystical fire pit. And if Hubby is up for cleaning out gooey remains while I scrub the charred skewers, there will be many more magical, stress-relieving evenings ahead.
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Micki Bare is a columnist for the Arkansas News Bureau and the Courier-Tribune in Asheboro, N.C., and author of the book, “Relative Expressions.” She lives in Asheboro with her husband and three children. Her e-mail address is mickibare@inspiredscribe.com.
