Campfire

Is it valid to express the quality of a campfire conversation based on the ratio of [length of conversation] / [time it will take for the fire to die]?




It always seems to me that a “campfire” conversation is over too quickly; the best kinds of fireside conversation happen on a watch. A fire-watch. A night watch, too: Keeping your eyes open for suspicious activity, anticipation and persistence.
I think that you can have this kind of watch without going all night; watching a fire die to the last embers should still count. If you put out the fire and still have some charred logs left in the pit that can be burnt again the next day, you didn’t watch.

At the beginning of the night, Fire is stirs our spirit to playfulness and wit. As the roaring and spitting and chuckling of the fire grows to its hottest, your conversation will warm and you will sometimes make surprisingly bold statements. It works, though, because I’ve always found that the fire draws any ill will out of these conversations. Foolish talk is diffused and carried up with the subtle smoke and the sound of sparks. It is very difficult to be an enemy of someone you share a fire with; even more difficult, I think, than to dislike someone while you're eating with them. If there's eating and fire together, congeniality will reign.
Thus the fire is also a peace-bringer; it calms the soul as we bring our words into focus. As the fire wanes in the late hours, the air changes and the stars become clearer. The conversation slows to explore the deep mysteries. On the most blessed occasions, you will see the aurora come out to quench the last of the embers: all are struck dumb as the waves in the sky draw the heat of the flame into a cool and tranquil cascade of mysterious vapours. A star falls to mark the event, and the conversation resumes in hushed tones of awe and reflection.
The fire is done: only a few glowing coals remain as the companions prepare to leave the fireside and return to the cold and dark world outside.

(Yes, I wrote this at one in the morning.)