On some snowy February days, I drove from my cabin, crossed the Rio Grande Valley north of Santa Fe, and joined other firefighters at sunrise in an icy, snowy place in the Jemez Mountains. I’m used to working on fires in the spring, summer or fall, but here we were with layers of warm gear under our fireproof clothing, blowing into our hands and standing in the sun when it finally came up. Then we set out to burn piles of slash on a snowy slope, deep in the Valles Caldera National Preserve.