Fire

Anyone from the area probably heard about the apartment building that went up in flames two nights ago in Fargo. Andrea lives a few blocks from there and we saw it! It was crazy. That day it was hot like summer so I was out skating around on my ‘blades and enjoying the nice weather while I could. I at the end of my route, heading back toward her neighborhood, when I saw some smoke billowing up into the sky. I couldn’t tell where it was coming from because there was a building blocking the view. When I was able to see the building, I saw flames engulfing three levels of balconies right in the middle! At this point the fire department was not yet on the scene and people were still streaming out of the building. I stopped to talk to a runner who was watching and within minutes a fire truck was on the scene. The hoses came out and soon the fire was out (or so I thought). It seemed pretty serious. I saw a women get rescued from her balcony with a ladder! I hate to just stare, and it seemed like it was over with, so I took off.
When I got home I turned on the news and saw that the fire had not been put out after all and instead had came roaring back and engulfed the whole building. I wend on the deck and saw a lot of black smoke, much worse than it was before. Andrea was out running with Jakey and had been gone for awhile so I assumed they were watching the fire. I jumped on Kirk’s old bike and headed back to the scene (not THE scene of course, but an area where I had a better view). I ran into Andrea, who brought Jake home and got on her own bike and joined me and hundreds of others to watch the flames take over the building.
Why is it so hard to look away from such events? We just couldn’t stop staring at those flames. It was fascinating. Although I knew people’s homes were being destroyed and it was a dangerous situation I still couldn’t stop looking. I wasn’t the only one. Traffic around that area was suddenly dense like it was rush hour and people were crowded on the sidewalk across the street from the fire. I was pretty sure that the people who lived there were safely out because I had seem them exiting when I passed by earlier. However, I had seen a lot of the residents outside with dogs so I knew animals were allowed and I kept thinking about animals that might be trapped. What if someone hadn’t had time to get their cat or dog or what if they hadn’t been home? That would be really awful.
I’ve had about enough of fire lately. Two weekends ago a historic building went up in flames in the middle of the night. I knew it was a restaurant, but it had been other things in it’s time (it was 110 years old). The café closed 15 years ago when the owners became too old to keep up with the business. It was gutted a few years ago when someone purchased the building with plans to renovate it and open another restaurant but the plan fell through due to money problems. Now the poor old building, which holds memories for so many people, is standing on its corner with a collapsed roof, shattered windows, and blackened bricks.

My favorite memory of the café took place when I was in second grade. My dad was still in Yemen and the rest of the family lived in a small rental house in town. My aunt and my two cousins were visiting. We spent a lot of time with them. Whenever my uncle was busy with work or traveling they would come to visit us or we would visit them. Of the five kids, I was the only one in full time school and Andrea was in part time Kindergarten so they could do stuff like that. On that particular weekend, it was blizzarding but I suppose the moms didn’t want to cook so we decided to go eat at the restaurant. Our house was 2 blocks (if even) from it, so we would have probably walked. Since the streets were covered with snow, my mom and Kris pulled us there in sleds! It was very enchanting to be among the sparkly fresh snow. It was a typical café where men sit around and drink coffee. It was a deep building, so it was pretty dark in there, especially toward the back. What I remember most about the interior was that there were pictures of all of the U.S. presidents on the wall.

The weekend before that, an old abandoned farm near my hometown went up in flames and arson is suspected. It was a huge old house, and I believe it once was beautiful. The owners, who I won’t name (one of my history teachers in college was fascinated with local lore and legend and wrote something about it on his website and apparently some family members found it and got upset. However, if they were upset I don’t know why those family members didn’t come back to deal with their abandoned property). Apparently, they were a wealthy and reclusive family and one day they just left the house and never came back. This happened, I believe, in the 1960s. They left the house with everything in it and it was littered with paper, magazines, clothing, and other debris. When I saw it for the first time a few years ago some furniture was left over but everything was completely trashed. There was a basement and a large attic filled with possessions. If I recall, I think I counted six or seven bedrooms in the house and it had two balconies, both which had collapsed. This place was very creepy and the strange circumstances of the family abandoning it have fed into many urban (or should I say, RURAL) legends about the house and made it a fun destination for teenagers trying to spook themselves at night. For example, the family had its own cemetery on the property, complete with a fence and a big gate, which you can kind of see from the main highway that passes by. (The road leading to farm was plowed up years ago by the farmer who owns the surrounding land. The best way to get there is by snowmobile. When I went, my dad called the landowner and got permission to drive across his field so I saw it in the light of day).
Although I love creepy legends and scaring myself, in daylight the place made me pretty sad. The house was once beautiful and special and it became a dump that had been looted and vandalized beyond repair. Even more disturbing, the cemetery markers had been stolen and looted over the years, which is very sick. I wish I knew why the original owners just let it fall into ruin instead of taking care of it or just selling it. I guess that’s why it’s so fascinating. Anyway, someone burned it down. And someone may or may not have burned the old restaurant down too. If they did, I hope they are found and pay for what they did. Seriously, arson is not a funny prank. It puts the fire department at risk and uses resources of taxpayers. And what if another emergency happened at the same time and the personnel were busy responding to some stupid trick? Ughhh…it’s all sad.