Between the harmony of summer and the horror of intentional fires: a reflection on the fragility of nature and the invisible shadow of those who destroy it.
By Jorge Alonso Curiel
HoyLunes – “This doesn’t happen in winter, does it?” my partner asks me, as we watch the sunset over the seafront promenade of Cullera, leaning on the window of the apartment, on a first floor, that we have rented these days. “Isn’t summer a gift?” she asks again. “Of course it is,” I reply with a smile.
At that hour, the promenade turns into a continuous parade of people walking peacefully and relaxed, after spending the afternoon at the beach or in the swimming pools, in search of a table to have dinner in one of the many restaurants, or simply for the pleasure of strolling in such a serene, calm atmosphere.
A father carries his small son on his shoulders, holding his hands, while the mother, at his side, bursts into laughter at something her husband has said that we haven’t managed to hear. Two young and beautiful friends, sitting on the small wall that separates the promenade from the beach, chat animatedly in front of us; from time to time they look at us and smile. On the terrace of a restaurant, a family begins to enjoy a huge paella. Three teenagers, dressed in white T-shirts and dark shorts – as if they had agreed on it – walk arm in arm, hands on shoulders, perhaps looking for other friends. Sitting on a folding chair on the promenade, the caricaturist sketches, on a canvas placed under a lamppost and also lit by a flashlight, a somewhat nervous boy under the attentive gaze of his parents, who can’t stop smiling. A mature couple, surely already retired, hurry along, appearing lost, again and again under our window, going from one side to another, looking for some venue or the entrance door of a building. On the beach sand, in the distance, almost at night, a group of eight people, of different ages, sit in a circle, talking accompanied by the sound of the waves. By the shore, we also notice those who stroll, shoes in hand, while the water caresses their feet…
These days, the promenade is a whole human spectacle for those who like to look, to observe. And needless to say, for writers, for whom one of our most pleasurable obligations is to look out the window.
“It’s true; this doesn’t happen in winter,” I tell my partner. “The seasons change the way we live and act. With the cold and the days with less sun, the sea is left alone and sad, and what it provokes are different matters.” “Yes,” she replies, “but it’s not as joyful as now\…”
As soon as she finishes saying this, we realize that the television was still on at the far end of the room, because the alarming words of the news anchor reach us with a subject not too cheerful either. “A firefighting worker arrested for causing, due to ‘work-related interests,’ the fire that devastated 2,200 hectares in Ávila.” “A 63-year-old woman and two men arrested for starting several fires in A Coruña.” “A man arrested for intentionally provoking six fires in Málaga.” “Fires started in León, Zamora, Ourense…”
Spain burns this August, with already 157,000 hectares devastated, in what is one of the worst years of fires in the last twenty years. Several deaths, towns evacuated… What drives someone to start a fire? What turns a person into a terrorist of nature?
“Why do they do it?” she asks me. I don’t know what to answer.
After a couple of minutes, I tell her that only a murderer can burn the miracle and the gift that our forests are. And as always, he goes unnoticed in everyday life, without showing it, without shouting it, living alongside others without anyone realizing it… until they are discovered. And perhaps, who knows, one of them has just walked past our window, so calm, without guilt for what he has done or will do, on this perfect summer night, on this promenade where harmony reigns, so far from bad intentions.
With the television still murmuring in the background, we now look, with some unease, in a different way, at the spectacle of this seaside promenade.
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