Fire Story

Thinking of Keith in his backwoods fantasy retirement, I enjoyed this article from the SJMercury about 89-year-old Jack English returning to his cabin in the woods after the recent fires.

Firefighters and English had fought to save the isolated cabin - yards from the flames, and a steep five-mile hike from the nearest dirt road. Today it remains as tidy as the day it was built, using tools carried in by backpack and mule.

Its preservation saved a unique way of life stretching back to the Civil War, when homesteaders created ranches out of the small but lush valleys of this rugged wilderness. They have since been enveloped by federal forests.

English, a professional carpenter, built the one-room cabin, with its lovely beamed ceilings, paned redwood windows and no electricity. He has a two-year supply of food, which he cooks on a Coleman stove.

"It was so smoky, you could hardly see," he said. "But it was safe. That's what I wanted. I wanted to get back here."

I liked his routine.

He awakes every day at daybreak. Sometimes he drinks tea; other times, a cup of Folgers coffee, boiled on a camp stove. His morning routine is to wash dishes, then wipe the cabin floor clean with Murphy Oil. Later in the day, he spends an hour or two in his woodworking shop, building bows. Then he might read, or garden, or walk through the forest-fringed meadow.

On alternate days, he shaves. Once a month, he walks out to civilization for a trip to the bank or to visit his son and grandchildren.

It is a four-hour trip - two walking, two driving - to the nearest grocery.

Folgers, come on! That almost spoiled it for me.