I just don't feel rant-y enough these days, which I think is the death of interesting. Probably a horrible Rorschach of my twisted psyche that I equate anger with interesting.

Let's face it though. Puppies and rainbows just don't grab the headlines like massacres.

The fantastic part of the week was my aunt's visit. M. and I were both proud to show off our little house, our little town, our little lives.

My aunt revitalized me to pay tribute (or tithe) to the dearly departed Pat and try to capture something of her indelible mark on the planet. I had completely forgotten what may indeed be the punchline of one of the best little bits of her house fire saga.

After my mother's house burned just about to the ground, the phoenix rose. Well maybe it wasn't to the ground. The walls and roof were still there, but where decades of life and possessions were accumulated there now lay smoldering ruins. I honestly didn't know dishes, kitchen cabinets and food could all melt and fuse together into one unrecognizable mass dripping from the walls Dali-style.

The days after were baby steps of rebuilding. Until all is lost, you really do not understand how much you take for granted just getting through a day. Underwear, for example. When your house burns down, all you got left in that department is the smoky set of drawers on your backside. One pair of undies while everyone around you can cavalierly put on another pair without waiting for the wash cycle to spin down.

I twisted Pat's arm at Walmart. We didn't just pick up a jumbo pack of multi-colored cotton panties in her size. We picked up two. I think I coerced her into somewhere in the range of a full two weeks' of freshness.

My aunt took her to CVS for sundries. Sundries turned out to be a carefully chosen shade of lipstick and a more impulsive canned ham. The canned ham was punchline enough in the story, and you could end it there.

But, this week, my aunt reminded me of the next tier of that story. The tier that makes the story soar just a little bit higher, and reminded me of how a house fire does destroy damn near everything.

One thing you can't tell from movies or TV shows or news reports about fire is that it smells. Everything smells. Like a barbecue pit of hickory and mesquite, smoke crawls into every space.

The house smells. The air in the neighborhood smells. The clothes on you when you walk away from blaze smell. Smoke gets in your hair, your skin. The odor is pervasive. It doesn't wash out instantly. Especially so if you haven't yet gotten all of the new clothes to wear that you might need and you're making do with what you got.

Pat smelled. Behind her back, my brother took to calling her “Old Smokey.”

So, there they are in CVS examining the lipsticks, my mom and my aunt, her sister.

My aunt began to sense a little unease in the crowd in the store. People in the store had begun to smell smoke and report it to management. There was the bustle and hum of a building panic and emergency effort.

Pat looked at lipstick colors.

As they went to check out at the register, the store was beginning to enact it's safety plan and evacuate the customers. In perhaps the greatest single moment of understatement in the history of the world, Pat left the store saying, “Don't worry, it's just me.”