Tree Fire

It’s been an interesting last few days around here. Back on Saturday I went up to the Guthrie Theatre in downtown Minneapolis with a bunch of other Curriculum II students (like Javen, Carl, Sara, Kirsten and many others) to see a production of Shakespeare’s “As You Like It.” It’s actually an adaptation of the play set in the 1960s, so while it keeps all of the Shakespearian dialogue, it has an occasional modern exclamation or phrase, and outrageously tacky ’60s costumes. I’m talkin’ the whole shabang, leather-fringe “moccasin” jackets, shiny leisure suits, plenty of tie-dye, and even a multi-coloured smock for the stoned priest at the end. Maybe Shakespeare would roll over in his grave at the sight of this adaptation, but I loved it, it was tons of fun. The first couple of scenes were a bit confusing, but after that I finally started figuring who was who and what was going on. Shakespeare can be like that, it takes one’s complete concentration while listening to it, but I think the ’60s setting actually helped convey what was going on. “As You Like It” is actually one of the last productions to ever take place at the current Guthrie Theatre,
When we got back I went out to eat with Javen, Erin, Anders, Michelle and Mike down at Mexican Village in Mankato. Erin was down visiting GAC for the weekend, it was good to see her again. And I hadn’t hung out very much previously with the others, it was cool getting to know them a bit better. And at least a couple of us had been planning on going to the Gustavus Jazz Lab Band concert that evening, but the wait at Mexican Village prevented us from doing that. After dinner, I went to this weekend’s campus movie in Nobel, “Hotel Rwanda.” Wow, what a powerful movie (and one of the best movies I’ve seen in the last couple years). It really brought home what civil war and genocide like that is like. And it really made me think how the West, or outside groups in general, need to do something to stop the genocide that’s happening in Darfur, Sudan. You can bet that if this same exact thing was happening in Europe, that the UN, NATO, and heaps of countries would be falling all over themselves to do something to stop it, but since this is happening in Africa, nobody feels like they need or should do anything. It’s really frustrating. But the UN essentially let the Rwandan genocide happen, and they’re sitting on their hands again now, in a situation that’s almost just like it, all the while wondering why nobody did anything in Rwanda. The UN has developed into a completely impotent and worthless organization. Anyway, after the movie was done around midnight, we (Carl, Seth, Cory, Erika, and myself) came back to my section to watch a movie of Carl’s that he’s been raving about, “I Heart Huckabees.” Unfortunately I was too tired at that point, and it’s just kinda hard to follow a movie when you’re having to put all your concentration into simply keeping your eyes open (and not always succeeding). Part of it may also have had to do with that it’s kinda hard for me to switch gears so rapidly, from such a powerful, emotionally-charged film such as “Hotel Rwanda,” to a light-hearted philosophical comedy. So at this point I’m still neutral towards the movie, and I’ll give it another chance sometime, but everyone else really liked it. Then again, the rest of my sectionmates liking a movie is not indicative of me also liking it, so we’ll see.
I went to church here on campus Sunday morning (and heard another good sermon by Vicar Brian Beckstrom, I really like his sermons), and then in the early afternoon it was time for Jolene’s and Jess’s recital. Their roommate Liz was also supposed to be part of the recital, but she got mono earlier this spring, which set her a bit far behind. That meant that Jolene had to scramble over the last couple weeks to learn another 10-15 minutes of music, which she was kinda stressed about. But they both did awesome, Jolene on the viola and Jess on the flute, it was a fun recital. Also that afternoon was the study abroad info session for next year’s study abroad students and their parents. The Int’l Ed Office had a bunch of us returnees come and give a one-sentence blurb, either advice on what to bring or do wherever they were going, what not to do, or just something that stuck with us from our study abroad experience, so that was cool to be able to do that, and hear what everyone else had to say. I’m so jealous of all those students, I remember being in their exact position one year ago, I wish I could be going abroad again. I remember how excited I was to be going, and getting all the preparations ready, it was just such a fun time. Sigh. But then it was time to really get cracking on my Astrophysics assignment, which I’d fully neglected until then. As a result I was up till 3am workin on it, argh. Astro lab also contributed a bit to that late bedtime, although the first part of lab was awesome. We got out the t-shirt cannon again and brought it down to the football field, although this time we actually were shooting potatoes out of it. The first one we launched cleared the goal posts at the other end of the football field by a couple hundred feet in height easily. We don’t know exactly how far it went since we couldn’t quite see where it landed, but it sure looked like it made it all the way to the baseball diamond 200+ yards away!! It was rather impressive. Then we thought it’d be cool to see what happened if we launched it against the brick exterior wall of Olin, so we fired a couple spuds from point-blank range. Man oh man, were they ever blown into tiny bits! Seriously, it looked like they vaporized when they hit the wall, they hit it with such tremendous force. It was humorous seeing thousands of tiny bits of potato littering the grass and cement around there, and seeing how far away the starchy shrapnel flew. Hehe. 🙂
Monday was pretty interesting. A shade after 5:30 I was heading from Olin to the Caf to grab some supper with my roommates, when along the way I noticed the rather strong smell of smoke in the air. I figured someone was just having a barbecue somewhere and thought nothing of it, until I saw a group of five other students, who were walking back from the caf, suddenly veer off towards the east side of the Chapel. I looked over to see where they were heading, and noticed an S&S officer standing with a fire extinguisher by a large tree that had a fair bit of white smoke issuing forth from its base. That’s certainly not a common occurrence on this campus, so I went over there to take a look at what was happening. And sure enough, the tree was on fire. Not fully engulfed in flames or anything, it was just a small fire on one side of the base of the tree (in the first foot or two above the ground), but it also seemed to be burning deep inside the tree, and starting to move up the trunk, as evidenced by the smoke starting to seep out of the bark about six feet above ground. Aside from that group of five or six that got there a few seconds before me, I was the first gawker on the scene at around 5:35, but by this point an increasing number of students were gathering around to see what the heck was going on. After a few more minutes the St Peter Fire Dept showed up with a couple of trucks, and the firemen doused the flames inside the tree and out with a large amount of water and foamy soap or fire retardant. By about 6:00 the fire was out, and the firemen began axing away at the burned part of the tree, to make sure that there wasn’t any additional smoldering still happening inside the trunk, but in the course of doing that they realized just how rotten and hollow the tree was, so they decided it needed to be taken down within the next day, to ensure it wouldn’t collapse and fall on someone or the Chapel. Everyone’s sad that they were forced into having to cut the tree down, because it had a great deal of sentimental value for the college. First, it was the largest and oldest tree on campus (located by the northeast corner of Christ Chapel), and was one of the few trees to survive the F4 tornado that ripped through Gustavus and Saint Peter back on March 29, 1998. A couple profs told me that after the tornado, pieces of Nobel Hall (a few hundred feet away) and its ventilation ducts and insulation were caught high up in its branches. Nobody really knows quite how the fire started, the one sure thing that everyone can agree on is that it wasn’t caused by lightning, there were no storms anywhere nearby, and only high cirrus clouds aloft. One possibility (and don’t snicker) is that it spontaneously combusted, from all the heat inside the tree that was being generated by the rotting and decomposition of the trunk. But the theory that’s most widely suspected is that it was arson, that someone intentionally set it on fire, possibly with a cigarette beneath the hole that already existed at the base on that side of the tree, and almost certainly some sort of accelerant was used. But it wasn’t poured on the bark, because that wasn’t really burning, it was more of an interior fire than anything else. So it’s quite puzzling trying to suss out what actually happened. Another thing to think about when considering the arson possibility is that it was in broad daylight, shortly after 5pm on a relatively busy sidewalk (Hello Walk); in other words, somebody would had to have seen something. The whole thing’s just weird. So my roommates were extremely puzzled by my absence at dinner, but when they were done at 6:15 and came outside, I saw them and told them what had happened, and I think they understood why I wasn’t in the caf quite when I said I was gonna be. 🙂
Monday evening after supper I went to Prof. Dick Fuller’s annual Manhattan Project lecture. He’s a former physics prof here at GAC, winner of the first “professor of the year” award at Gustavus back in the ’70s, and founder and longtime-director of Curriculum II. His dad was a physicist who was working on the Manhattan Project in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, after getting a personal letter from J.R. Oppenheimer inviting him to join the project, so Dick Fuller has a very personal connection to the project. I’ve heard him give the variations on the Manhattan Project lecture at least four times now, and each time is even more interesting, he’s that fascinating and engaging of a speaker. I mean, we all learn about the Manhattan Project and World War II in broad brushstrokes in our history classes or on docos on TV, but Dick goes so in depth and into such rich detail about what was happening behind the scenes that doesn’t often get reported, that you can’t help but be spellbound by what he’s saying. He of course had to have some physics in there, but I was sitting next to Javen for the lecture, and afterwards Javen said that he was impressed how he kept the physics at a level that the non-physicist could understand, and that he was even able to understand and laugh at most of the jokes (many of them physics jokes). That’s what made (and makes) Dick Fuller such an outstanding lecturer. But it makes me sad that I probably won’t get to hear his lectures again, his Manhattan Project one really has been my favourite lecture that I’ve heard in each of the last four years at Gustavus. A bit after that it was time for Men’s Christian Fellowship, followed by a limited amount of reading before I basically collapsed and fell asleep. Three nights in a row of 3am bedtimes (when my body was used to 1am bedtimes) finally caught up to me.
This morning (Tuesday) the big tree that suffered the fire yesterday evening was actually cut down, they sawed all the limbs off it before taking the trunk down in sections. It looks so bare now on that part of campus without that enormous maple tree. Golf was cancelled this morning due to rain, which allowed me a chance to get a bit more caught up in my reading for Senior Sem, which was nice. Then while we’re at lunch in the caf we see on the TV a big headline that a new Pope had just been elected, Germany’s Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who has taken the name Pope Benedict XVI, as I’m sure you’ve all heard about by now. It’ll be interesting to see what kind of Pope he’ll be. Anyways, not anything overly interesting happened the rest of the day I guess, other than Proclaim, which is always enjoyable.
And just in case any of you reading this might need surgery in the future, remind your surgeon beforehand not to let you catch fire while you’re on the table. That’s just bad form. And then check out the story of this Melbourne teenager who let his obsession with trams go just a little too far. I mean, Melbourne’s trams are pretty sweet, but stealing them so you can take them on joyrides is a bit much. And what are your plans in 2034 and 2035? Just be aware that they might be interrupted by the very same asteroid that will be making a very near approach to Earth in 2029. Just thought you’d all like to be aware of that early on, so you can get it put on all your Palm Pilots well in advance. 😉