The Pipeline

Morning temp: 30F
Afternoon "high": 48F
Tonight's projected low: 25F
Humidity: 34%
Moon: Waning, 77%

OK, even my Canadian grandfather would agree it was damned cold today! With a West wind blowing steadily at 16 mph, it felt a good deal cooler than 48F, more like 38F.

1. Last Fall (in September, I believe), the county government sent a crew out to our land to cut back the tress, bushes and grass that had overgrown a section of our land underneath of which lies a natural gas pipeline, "The Pipeline," we call it. Thoughtfully, they asked whether we wanted the wood for ourselves (otherwise they would have dragged it away to the chipper), and when we said that we did they cut the branches and trunks into 10' - 20' segments and left them in piles on the ground. Now, the Pipeline runs several hundred feet away from our house, at a sharp downward angle, and so hauling anything up from the Pipeline isn't easy. The ground is rocky and uneven, so wheelbarrows and motorized vehicles are out. If this wood is going to make it up to the house, it's going to be carried by hand, and not just once but three times. Let me explain. As it runs away from the house, the Pipeline is crossed by a fence and two fairly wide streams. So, the wood has to be hauled to the first stream and tossed over (one large heavy piece at a time), hauled to the second stream and tossed over, hauled to the fence and (you guessed it) tossed over, at which point it can be loaded into a wheelbarrow and carried up to the house. I think so far I've spent about three days on this project, with probably two or three more to go before all of burnable wood is retrieved and stacked neatly beside the back porch. Of course, then it needs to be split and stacked.

But is the relatively small amount of firewood worth all of that work? Wouldn't it be more efficient to spend that time working for wages, and then spend your money buying firewood? A very good question, and one I'm asked fairly often. The only response I can give is that gathering, splitting and stacking my own firewood contiually teaches me something about myself. It teaches me to go slow and pace myself. It reveals to me where I have allowed work to become hurried, stressful and irritating, when work is supposed get my blood moving, expand my lungs and chest, and use and exert my own energy and agency in ways that working for wages from others never could. This, of course, is not to say that I should never work for wages, but rather that I should not always make economic efficiency my primary concern.