Tradition’s Burning Fire

by David Vicknair

Bonfires in Lutcher date back a hundred years. The people of Louisiana light massive, fifteen-to-twenty feet tall bonfires to usher Papa Noel every single Christmas. The Levee is lined with burning wooden pyramids meant to guide Papa Noel down the Mississippi River and, more symbolically, to usher in the beginning of Christmas. My family, Cajun to the core, used to build and light their own bonfire. For years there was a plot on the Levee that my family claimed, on which my father and my uncles all built bonfires. For years the Vicknair family carried on the bonfire tradition.

Then my Grandmother died. The matriarch, holding the family together, and making sure the tradition was passed down through the generations, was taken from us. The bonfires faded to memory. A happy memory to think about when going to bed or after a bad day, but nothing more than that. The bonfire book, with pages of records of everyone who had visited the Vicknair bonfire, became something to flip through for black and white nostalgia of days past. The tradition, while not dead, was no longer carried forward by the Vicknair family; until my Uncle bought a house on the Levee, and as Christmas of 2019 loomed, my family came together to relight the tradition of the bonfires.

When the time came I was sitting in front of that very house talking to my godmother, when I heard my dad calling me. His deep voice booming out through the humid Louisiana air. I finished my cake and began to walk towards the bonfire; completely unaware I was going to help light it . When my dad told me I was going to hold a torch it felt like I was coming of age in my family, a cajun Bar Mitzvah. I quickly picked up a torch then stood in front of the bonfire, my hands shaking in excitement and anticipation. In a way, as I stood in front of the pyramid of dried, oil-soaked wood which had the blood, sweat, and some tears of the Vicknair family poured into it, the world seemed perfectly at peace with itself. Then it was time to light the fire. The nostalgia and tradition that went into this one moment, was palpable. For a second, the world seemed to go still as I held my torch against my cousin’s. The only noise was the “whoosh” of fire running over the cloth. The world sped up and I looked at my uncle and my father standing close together in a manner that reflected the essence of a brotherhood born from years of shared experiences. In lighting this fire I was joining decades of proud Vicknair men before me that had paved the way, mastering the skills required to cutting the wood, build the bonfire, soak the logs, and finally, light the fire.

I learned quickly that it is not easy to get a massive pile of wood, no matter how much oil had been poured on it, to light. For what felt like an eternity, but was only about a minute in actuality, the wood would not light. The only light shining through the darkness was from the torches, which scattering little embers in the wind as they crackled and struggled to light the bonfire. Then a hiss, then a spark, then the smell of burning.

Then with a roar the fire came rushing over the wood. Tendrils of smoke entering my nose, my mouth, my ears, so much smoke you could barely see your hand in front of your face. Then the smoke began to rise and the catalyst of teary eyes and smokey blindness was revealed. The fire seemed hungry, reaching madly for what it could be. As if trying to escape the prison of wood it had been constrained to. It seemed conscious. The flames twisting and turning as the seconds ticked by, even time getting lost in flame. The noise and chatter of the world was drowned out as the music of the fire’s random, manic movements rang clear and true as it scaled the bonfire. My family sat silent. The younger generation watching in awe totally unaware of the danger, and seeing as children do, only the beauty of the fire. The older generation was suddenly wrapped in memories of what once was and what will one day be again. Yet fire, ignorant of its human spectators, continued to wind and burn in a ferocious beauty. The size of the flame became magnificent and as I sat there and stared up at the sky, now streaked with flames, I felt proud. I felt as Alexander The Great must have after bringing the Persian Empire to its knees. I felt as Charlemagne must have after conquering and converting the Lombard Empire. This fire, it was mine. I helped to create the great fiery stallion raging around the wood in front of me. Yes, I no longer had control of it, but I brought it back. Back from wherever fire resides before it bounds into existence. Something so ancient it dates back to the second God said “Let there be light”. I was the one who brought it back, but the fire didn’t care. It was consumed with one desire, the desire to expand, to spread to places it was not yet welcome though one day would consume nonetheless. It leapt out of the lighter and onto my torch. It sprinted from my torch to the wood, and now it was trying to reach the sky.

Humanity sees fire as something that should be left alone, to guard against, or to use for personal gain. Sherman used it to cripple the South and win the civil war. The Mongols used it to raze entire cities to the ground. The Russians used fire to burn their cities to the ground so Napoleon would starve, but fire is not for destruction, it is merely misused to satiate humanities desire for power. Fire is a life bringer. Fire brought unity to my family, an old way of life that lay dormant, not forgotten but gone, rose to fill us once again when the flames leapt, and the fire raged, and the wood crackled, and the pillars fell, and the embers smoldered. That bonfire, the fire that was built and started by us, did more than my family could ever do for itself. More than any family could ask for. It brought us together, for one simple night of laughter, joy, and somewhat senseless revelry it seemed as though the only chaos, the only discord, and the only destruction lay in the euphony of the crackling roar of the beautifully frightening inferno. Contained for the time being, but longing to be free to spread wherever the wind takes it.