Hills and Fires

As long as I'm telling stories about events I barely remember, here's one that stays with me even though it feels more like a dream than like anything that ever happened. I must have been 10 or 11 years old at the time. I still swam—not competitively or anything, just in general—and a buddy and I were crawling our way around the bay when we looked back and saw the hillside above on fire.

It wasn't actually the hillside, of course, just a house on the hillside. But from the water it looked like everything was on fire. We raced back to shore to... I don't know what our plan was. Notify the authorities that there was a very obvious fire blazing directly above them?

I have no idea what happened after that. Presumably the fire got put out and we ate lunch. Then we went to high school, college, and who knows what other shenanigans. I got married, maybe he did. That guy was really smart, he probably rules the world by now. He was a helluva Dungeon Master, I'll bet he'd make a great CEO.

Another time, not very far from there, an RV caught fire. They had to close down the southbound side of the road, which caused major delays. What is it about hills and fires?

Years later that hill had other problems. I forget the specifics, but it had something to do with houses sinking into the ground, which wasn't quite as stable as developers—apparently to the satisfaction of the appropriate government agencies (notify the authorities!)—had suggested.

It occurs to me now that I should tell better stories. Be assured that if I knew better stories, I would in fact tell them. Truth be told, I probably do know better stories, I just can't remember them.