Vitaliy Gritsak Case

Vitaliy Gritsak

English/Mrs. Beck

Essay

The Forgotten Detail

The enjoyment of laughter is a thing that can cause a person to lose track of time. That day, I heard the giggling happy children like those at a family picnic. I knew they were examining our new car which belonged to my uncle; so I went up to the front of the house. But I'll never forget the distinct aroma that was given off into the air fifteen seconds when it all happened. The air became moist, and you felt a sudden rush to the back, like Death just has passed through you. At this time, I had a sudden urge to check the back of the house that I was in front of; normally you would be fine walking into the backyard carelessly, but at this moment I was in a state of slight panic because there was a fire about fifteen feet high raging from the back of the shed, and in that very moment my mind was going all over the place. My first instinct was to hose down the fire with water, but after I took a quick breath I started to smell the burning wood crackling gently every so often, like a peaceful, clear night with the stars gazing at you. In these few seconds I manage to focus on what may be the best decision to do, which in this case was to get the two full containers of gas inside the shed. These became my first priority. Shortly after I got the gas out, I started to smell wax on a spare front bumper of a car, which started to make it coil up. In this little rescue mission of getting what was important out of the shed, I forgot about the fire burning which reached about twenty-five feet high now. I started to see leaves falling to the ground as the tree breathed in the dark apparition of the smoke reaching the tips of its poor leaves. So like any young boy would do, I tried to be the hero and put a fire down with just a water hose. In my observation that the fire wasn't getting much smaller, I remembered half an hour earlier that I had lit two candles behind this shed, just because I love to see how fire burns. Subsequently I now was watching pretty neutrally what I love to do. What would normally bring me joy brought me an unexpected visit in a dramatic way. In about five minutes of all this bravado, guilt, and realization, the fire department came, put the fire out, and checked if everything was okay. After it all settled down, I had to say sorry to my own grandparents for burning the back of their shed down, which was a childish in attention which was a shameful thing to me, but it all worked out in the end with a bowl of cereal.