I LOVE playing with fire. I like making, lighting, and tending it. According to anthropologists, I suffer from a case of arrested development. But so do you. The scientists point out that in Indigenous cultures, children are encouraged to play with fire almost from birth. They make fires and cook mud pies. They burn themselves. They learn fire’s ways. Consequently, their fire curiosity is satisfied before they reach double digits. After that, fire becomes just another tool. Like a hatchet, only hotter.
Thirty years ago, on my only trip to Africa, I saw just how arrested my development