The bright flash of a fireworks display is a smorgasbord of shock and awe. Sadly they go out too fast and are good only for one night of wild magic (with beer, sisig and peanuts). There is greater, more enduring magic in the slow, dependable fires of a hearth. They give the most comfort. They only go out when they are not tended and cared for. A hearth stays in one place: when your life is lived too fast, when you move around too much you can't really expect its warmth to catch up with you. Sometimes the constant level of warmth, the sparks, the crackle of hearths are inconvenient. But hearths are like loved ones that way. You live with them or you walk out-- though generally they'll still be around and functioning when you come back. Some hearths will suffer though, from neglect and disuse, buried as they are in a pile of last year's accumulated soot and ashes-- the by-products of their devotion to the families they keep warm.

Sadly you won't find hearths in the artificial heart of a Makati high-rise condominium unit.The flames there are the stunted blue methane fires of a gas range --great for cooking, if the people living there still knew how to do so. Or worse, they could be the sterile pulses of fluorescence: hot and bright, almost maintenance-free but providing little in the way of what counts: cheer, comfort, warmth. A touch of the known.

Not many people prefer hearths these days. It's too difficult to just sit in front of one and appreciate the warmth and the sparks and the crackling and the popping and the smoke when people are simply too fidgety on account of whatever keeps them busy. It isn't surprising then that people live such cold and cheerless lives.