When Earl opened the door to the fire lookout that was to be my honeymoon love nest, all I could focus on was the mess. Dead flies lay everywhere, while a stovepipe dangling from the ceiling pointed to a pile of black that was soot or flies or both. The bed, the stove and everything loose was piled around the fire finder, completing the mess. And the windows, hundreds of them, were filthy.
I was just married, and in a few days would bring my new bride, Lynda, to a place I had described as a romantic, exotic hideaway. Whoops! One look at this, and I might spend the summer alone. And on top of that, my boss, Earl Taylor, who was Slate Creek Ranger District’s fire control officer, was spraying bug killer into the attic, so that more flies buzzed out of the cracks and spiraled down to join the other flies, soot and general grime.
When I crunched across the carpet of chitin, it was so disgusting that I almost forgot how scared I’d been climbing 50 feet to a catwalk built of boards that were way too far apart and teetered when stepped on. Fifty feet didn’t sound like much just hearing it, but my first time looking down between the catwalk boards convinced me that I had made a big mistake.
This lookout idea had sounded very romantic to me, so when Lynda told me that she had always wanted to work on a fire watch for the summer, I was excited. My anticipation grew as Earl and I led a pack train with our supplies for the first part of the summer along the road through lingering snowdrifts. As we emerged from the trees into the clearing, my first view of the tower balanced on the high point of the ridge had thrilled me with the possibilities. However, I now figured my only chance for romance here was to get this place at least partly cleaned up, even though Lynda was the most understanding female I’d ever known.
