On Fire

“I do acroyoga,” the lovely woman standing next to me says.  “But since the days have gotten shorter, we’ve been adding fire to our performances.” 

“I have been doing yoga for 35 years and I don’t think fire was ever mentioned,” I say. 

We are at a women’s fundraiser.  There are about 200 ladies here from business, marketing, real estate, coaching, writing, painting and just about every other occupation.  I’m willing to bet I’m talking to the only one who sets herself on fire. 

“It gets darker earlier now so we use fire so the audience can see us.” 

It sounds very Hunger Games.   

“Couldn’t you just turn on a light?” 

Acroyoga combines yoga with acrobatics, she explains.  She shows me a video of her male partner lifting and twirling her in the air.  

“And you add fire?  Aren’t you scared?” I ask. 

It turns out there are three types of fire.  One uses a flame on the end of the rope.  One uses (I am not kidding here) fire in her palms.  She is not afraid of either of these, although I don’t see how you could not be afraid of them.  The third uses a device that fits on her hand and projects five fingers of fire.  She’s a little bit afraid of that one. 

“It gets very hot,” she says, shaking her hand as if she remembers the heat. 

“I’m supposed to use flame-proof gloves,” she says, “but I prefer cotton.  Sometimes that can be a problem.”  

Yes, what could possibly go wrong with flames and cotton gloves? 

She has beautiful long, gray hair.  I ask about it catching fire.  

She ties it back or wears a hat.  Although she does tell me that in one performance where they were using rope fire in front of children (“We had to keep telling them to move back.  There really wasn’t much room.”) her cowboy hat caught fire. 

Visions of Michael Jackson dance in my head. 

I lose sight of her as we make our way into the meeting room.  In the next two hours, we raise $55,000 for our charity. 

We are on fire.