Fleeing The Flame

            In life, there are two kinds of people: those that run from life and live cautiously and those that throw their caution into the wind and follow their dreams and desires through to the very end. "Fires," a short story by Rick Bass, is a tragic yet romantic tale of a simple logger in love with a woman he can never allow himself to have. His proclaimed self-control and fear of involving himself in a relationship that would undoubtedly end leaves Joe Barry, the protagonist, with mixed feelings of lament and pain. Using illustrious imagery and subtle analogies, Bass transforms the little logging community in the northern United States into a vivid struggle of a man against himself. The battle to suppress emotions and life itself out of fear, however, inevitably leads to a sense of loss, regret and sorrow.
             Throughout the entire short story, the action of running seems prevalent and is mostly emphasized through Glenda, a runner from farther south that travels north during the summer to train in the beautiful and elevated landscape of Joe's home town and a girl that eventually becomes his object of affection. When the protagonist first meets Glenda, he describs her as having "a big grin [ ] that belied her seriousness" and that "[she] had no worries [ ] she had only to run" (190). Not to be entirely taken literally, Bass makes it clear from the moment that Joe meets the apple of his eye that she lives to run, ironically both for and from life. Glenda never seemed "to miss [her boyfriend and ] didn't ever seem to think about him" either while in the valley near the Yaak River (190). Instead, she found solace and bliss in her running, ignorant to the rest of the world. As the relationship between the runner and the logger developed, so too did the caution exercised by Joe towards his feelings of Glenda.