I spent the day making a house out of bubble wrap with a roof of bamboo poles. Nineteenth century German architect Gottfried Semper described enclosure
as a basic architectural element, which originated in textiles such as woven grasses and branches. These in turn became screens,
tapestries and eventual walls to divide space (A. Palmer, 2015, Smithsonian).
What gives us a sense of home and safety? Philosopher Olivier Marc says if you give a child a box they will get inside of it. To seek enclosure and safety is a a basic instinct. When I was walking home yesterday a helicopter circled above and out to the river. I looked up and then south to see billowing black smoke from the direction I had just come. The new apartments down the street had caught fire and every fire truck within ten miles was soon screeching to the scene. My friend who lives next door to these apartments hosed down his house in case the large chunks of charred insulation should set his wooden shingles alight.
There is nothing more awe inspiring than the power of fire, except perhaps the power of the sea. This is especially true if it threatens our home, the center of our sense of security.
It's the second apartment building this year to burn on our street. The first was from a cigarette in a mattress. Time will tell what caused this latest one. Fortunately no one was hurt.
I'm required to do mandatory fire safety training for my hospice job every year for which I am grateful. and I have the utmost respect for volunteer firemen and women. They rush to the scene of any fire, walking into the flames when most of us are running the other way.
Creation of fire, however, is also the discovery which defines us as human (Ronnberg & Martin, 2010, ARAS) Fire was imagined as both a deity and a gift from the gods.
It's a primary component of the cosmos and a basic element of alchemical transformation. While considered destructive, humans would not have been able to cook foods or heat their dwellings without fire craft. Fire making is a skill in which people take great pride and care.
Both destruction and purification can be its the result. As in the legend of the phoenix, a transformed being can arise from the ashes of fire and when a forest burns it destroys life, but can promote the growth of new seedlings. Many plants and animals have have evolved adaptations for fire tolerance. The Southern California Lodgepole Pine's cones are sealed with a resin that can only be released by its heat and the Giant Sequoia depends upon fire to open up gaps in the forest canopy so their saplings can mature.
The presence of fire in the neighborhood makes me grateful and mindful of my own dwelling, the care we have taken with it, and the fortune we have had over the years to live here in safety.
How fragile is this sense of safety in the face of the raw elements of natural world.
What gives us a sense of home and safety? Philosopher Olivier Marc says if you give a child a box they will get inside of it. To seek enclosure and safety is a a basic instinct. When I was walking home yesterday a helicopter circled above and out to the river. I looked up and then south to see billowing black smoke from the direction I had just come. The new apartments down the street had caught fire and every fire truck within ten miles was soon screeching to the scene. My friend who lives next door to these apartments hosed down his house in case the large chunks of charred insulation should set his wooden shingles alight.
There is nothing more awe inspiring than the power of fire, except perhaps the power of the sea. This is especially true if it threatens our home, the center of our sense of security.
It's the second apartment building this year to burn on our street. The first was from a cigarette in a mattress. Time will tell what caused this latest one. Fortunately no one was hurt.
I'm required to do mandatory fire safety training for my hospice job every year for which I am grateful. and I have the utmost respect for volunteer firemen and women. They rush to the scene of any fire, walking into the flames when most of us are running the other way.
Creation of fire, however, is also the discovery which defines us as human (Ronnberg & Martin, 2010, ARAS) Fire was imagined as both a deity and a gift from the gods.
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| Sumerian Fire God |
It's a primary component of the cosmos and a basic element of alchemical transformation. While considered destructive, humans would not have been able to cook foods or heat their dwellings without fire craft. Fire making is a skill in which people take great pride and care.
Both destruction and purification can be its the result. As in the legend of the phoenix, a transformed being can arise from the ashes of fire and when a forest burns it destroys life, but can promote the growth of new seedlings. Many plants and animals have have evolved adaptations for fire tolerance. The Southern California Lodgepole Pine's cones are sealed with a resin that can only be released by its heat and the Giant Sequoia depends upon fire to open up gaps in the forest canopy so their saplings can mature.
The presence of fire in the neighborhood makes me grateful and mindful of my own dwelling, the care we have taken with it, and the fortune we have had over the years to live here in safety.
How fragile is this sense of safety in the face of the raw elements of natural world.
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