"It's just a yard fire ..."

On our way to feed the ducks this evening, I noticed a lot of smoke coming from the backyard of one of the houses in our old neighborhood. I slowed down to study it since it seemed to be a lot more smoke than a grill would normally put out, and saw flames coming from under the brick boundary wall that divided the yard from the road. I pulled over to the side of the road and called 911 while K went to knock on the door and make sure the tenants knew they were on fire. As the first police car arrived on the scene (within moments ... I wonder if it was the police officer who lives across the street from the scene of the fire,) K came back and informed me that the woman who answered the door was very calm and informed him that "it's ok, it's just a yard fire." The 911 operator assured me that the fire department was on its way, and since the thick smoke was making it hard for oncoming traffic to see that we were stopped in the right lane, we decided to clear out.

At the playground over a mile away, we could smell the smoke when the wind blew in the right direction, and we could hear the siren when the fire truck came. I don't think the owners of the house had any intention of calling for help, so I wondered whether they were able to control it after all, and whether I had wasted the time of the authorities, or whether I might have done a good thing, in case the fire was harder to control than they thought it would be. This is one of those things that I'll never know, but at least the fire never reached the house or the neighbors' houses!