"In the front yard?" she said with a touch of incredulity.
"We had big front yards in Shady Grove," I said. "The band was always located on the front porch, 'making music,' as the saying had it, and we didn't want the fire too near the band so we put it far out in the front yard, close to the road."
"Why build a bonfire at all?"
"Ah, it's one of those holdovers from the early days when my ancestors came over from Wales and were isolated in Appalachia. I didn't know that when I was a kid, but I didn't need to know. It was simply fun to have a bonfire in the night and that was reason enough. Much later, I learned that we were following a remnant of the old Celtic customs of our ancestors."
She glanced at me and I saw a sort of whatsit expression on her face. An expression that could easily have been followed by her excusing herself to attend to something she'd forgotten. I see that expression often when I begin one of the stories my childhood.
"You see, in Northern Europe, the Celts would build bonfires on the hilltops to help warm up the earth and add a little more light to the night. Moral support for the sun, I think it was. They would then beat drums to raise a ruckus and frighten the Spirit of Winter away.
That was the whole point of May Day Eve--to push Winter back and encourage the new sun king to roll up his sleeves, spit on his hands, and get down to the business of summer."
"That's interesting," she said but her tone wasn't convincing.
"Well, the reason I bring it up..."
"Why do you bring it up?"
"Because I'm sick of winter and I'm sick of this virus thing. I don't like it. I know that members of our audience who operate from a base in New England or from the steppes of Russia are probably rolling their eyes right now at the thought of winter in North Carolina, but I'm sure we're all aligned in our disapproval of the virus. I think Providence has jumped the rails again, Poopsie. This is certainly not the stuff to give the troops if you want my opinion."
"Which troops," she said.
"Don't worry about which troops," I said. "We've had some warm days recently and I've seen the bluebird around the neighborhood and I do hope that she sets up shop on the corner and gets down to business soon. Bringing a little sweetness and light to the situation I mean. So I've decided to do my little part and start banging away and push this virus thing away with the winter."
"Banging?"
"That's right, I've built a bonfire in my heart and I'm going to start banging on anything that I can bang, which at present is Happy Cats Wellness, that online fount of information to keep cats and their caretakers healthy and happy."
"What do you plan to do with Happy Cats?" she said with a lot more enthusiasm than I'd noticed earlier in the conversation. "I thought you'd given it up, shut down the website, and closed the door."
"That's true," I said. "But Uma Maya has inspired me to crank it back up. I plan to stir up the Happy Cats website and launch a full-frontal social media attack."
"A little more of the Beltane analogy and a little less of the militarism," she said.
"Sorry, it's that old Napoleon line that runs through my soul," I said.
"Right," she said.
And so there you are dear reader. You've been apprised of the entire affair. You should now consider yourself banged to the fullest and you should feel much better for it. I'll keep you updated as the story progresses.