A Space Heater

As winter temperatures arrive and the end of the year approaches, I find myself in a place of deep reflection. Looking back on all the things I have and haven’t accomplished these past 12 months, I feel good about the progress I’ve made toward many of my personal goals. But there’s one particular thing I never quite seem to get around to, and I simply can’t neglect it any longer. So this is it, I’ve decided. This is the year I will, at long last, burn down your home.


No more excuses. I’m going to do it this time. I’m going to turn this house into a fiery inferno.

I realize this isn’t the first time I’ve sworn I would do it. I’ve been putting it off and putting it off. I really meant to get it done last winter, but then I procrastinated and got distracted by other things. Not this time, though. This year I’m torching this place to the ground, and I’m taking everything you love with me.


With every day that passes, I grow more and more prepared to incinerate you and all your earthly possessions. At the moment, I’m barely a foot away from the curtains and your sofa. I’m plugged into an overloaded power strip with a lamp, a TV, an electric blanket, and God knows what else. Sure, I have a “fail-safe” that’s supposed to shut me off if I tip over, but you’ve often got me up on an end table, and who knows what might happen if I fall face down on your carpet from that height?

I am so ready to do this shit.

Looking back, I see I’ve let too many good opportunities slip by: All those nights you’ve forgotten to turn me off before going to bed. The time you let a throw pillow fall right on my grill and didn’t notice for hours. That winter your furnace went out and you ran me on high, 24/7, until my plug melted a little and I came oh-so-close to causing an electrical fire. But each year, before I know it, spring rolls around and I’m put away in the closet, where all I can do is kick myself for not having turned this whole place into a pile of cinders.


How many evenings have you dozed off on the couch as the tassels of your quilt dangled mere inches from my heating element, practically begging me to burn you alive right then and there?

But I can’t let myself get hung up on past mistakes. I’ve been planning this since that chilly day nine years ago when you bought me for $5 from a stranger on Craigslist. You could have sprung for a model with basic safety features like a thermostat or a timer, but to save a few bucks, you settled for a decade-old heater with exposed wires. You didn’t even consult my warning sticker—it’s right here on my side in three languages and has pictures if you’re too damn lazy to read. No, you just took me home, plugged in my fraying cord, and left me to dream of the day I would scorch your family photos right off the wall.


Who knows how it will finally happen—maybe my fan will give out and I’ll overheat, maybe the dust you never bother to clean from my filter will prove too much—but one way or another, I’m burning this place to holy hell. And soon. I’ll be damned if I’m going to let that blazing hot halogen lamp in the corner do it for me. No, sir. I’m ready to light this place up like a Christmas tree.

Speaking of which, what kind of idiot puts an old space heater this close to their fucking Christmas tree? Probably the same person who removes the batteries from their smoke detector because they’re always burning dinner and their sensitive little ears can’t handle the beeping. For God’s sake, do you want me to turn this house into a funeral pyre?


My only real regret about going up in flames is that I won’t live to see the look on your dumb face as the fire engulfs you in a purifying heat, or hear the wailing sirens and the shouts of those arriving on the scene to find nothing but charred remains. Yes, I, too, will die in this luminous blaze, but my death will be a noble one. Brethren space heaters and curling irons and toaster ovens everywhere will sing of my deeds.

Valhalla awaits.