Again, he’s remembering.
The fire was something like 80 years ago. It is in the past.
But he doesn’t want to re-live the memory of finding the fire. He wants it to not be there.
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I think it is going to be very difficult to separate Alexanders memories due to the Altzeimers, and the fact he has admitted to telling white lies obviously to cover his tracks in the past, he is now getting them confused, and this is what we need to unravel. fact and fiction.
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I find it interesting that it’s refered to as a lamp.
He is 86 y/o so, 1932- fires were common back then- caused by lanterns…
With all the talk of keeping Lionel the bull from kicking people in the face, I am starting to wonder if the bull ever kicked Alexander in the head…
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He was young enough to understand his mother’s instructions to get the lamp,
So maybe it took place around 1940? Around age 8?
Who talks like that? I would think “I couldn’t take my eyes off the red dot” would be a normal thing to say in that situation. It’s almost like some other consciousness is intermingling with his responses, trying to blend in un noticed?
Maybe Emily’s impatience with Alex is causing her to effect the stimulation, even if accidental?
“Burning hay and Burning cows!” “What a wonderful smell you’ve discovered”
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Could this have been a wartime memory, the shiny red dot in the sky being something like a zeppelin, do we actually know where he was during his childhood, I think Europe rather than states as he mentions a Farm rather than a Ranch!!
He would have been 8 in 1940
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Interesting, reading up on this now. Even more interesting that it is to be distinguished from lying as there is no intent to deceive.
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Well, farm is used a LOT in the US but, he does say village which is not used in the US. What about Canada? If not, then I agree, he was raised in Europe, possibly France, which would make wartime memories a real possibility.
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We should all go out for PhD’s when this is over. 
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Doubtful…his memory has nothing to do with war…he was getting a lamp during a stormy night and his bar caught on fire. No mentions of war really.
Fun fact: apparently burning hay smells like marijuana…
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When Emily questions him about the fairs, Alexander says:
Emily :
I guess that you never liked going to the fair?
Alexander :
Well…It was a bit of a love-hate relationship, you could say.
Alexander :
I think I spent the majority of my summers between the ages of 8 and 17 in fairs like this.
Emily :
Really?
If this had taken place in Europe during WW2, the above is extremely unlikely.
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True. He would have been 17 in 1949…but if they still had the cows then the barn fire has nothing to do with Mabel, Eugenice and Lionel?
So it is a possibility then.
Yep can see your point. but don’t think we should just dismiss the possibility, the war was on at that time!!
On the WW2 route, I thought about the “lightning fell on the barn” and being the P38 Lockheed,
But, can’t find any leads further than that,
Yes, but there wouldn’t have been country fairs. Half the landscape had been flattened by bombing, there were occupying armies fighting in the fields, and most of the men had been conscripted.
Things like country fairs just didn’t happen.
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