This past week I had one outdoor task in mind—stacking firewood. Unlike other homes, where we needed four or more cords to keep us warm enough, Hank typically burns less than a cord to heat his wood shop that’s part of our home. Plus, he built a rather artistic woodshed, so we no longer have free-standing rows. Easy-peasy.
This fall we had two deliveries. First, our friend Mark dropped off a cord of seasoned hardwood close to the shed, which made for quick work stacking those logs.
On Wednesday, we had an unexpected delivery of a half-cord through our town’s program that supplies free firewood to residents from trees felled by the power company. (Thank you Buckland and the state Department of Conservation and Recreation.) Okay, that meant first consolidating the wood we already have into one section of the shed.
The logs were dropped at the bottom of the driveway because that was as far as the large dump truck could make it. No problem. Green hardwood makes for a heavier haul, especially since the driveway has an incline, but I was up for the challenge. I moved them using a wagon I borrowed from our son, Ezra.
Back and forth. Back and forth. I played music on my phone in my back pocket—Kate Mann who we heard singing on our recent trip to Taos. One of the pluses of doing such work is that my mind is free to think about my writing, solving problems, and reminiscing on past experiences.
Our first experience burning wood was in the middle of New Hampshire while living in a one-room cabin on a dirt road, 12-by-20 feet, with no electricity, phone, or indoor plumbing. We dipped a bucket into a nearby river when the handpump stopped producing water from the well. A portable toilet was in the attic, and we hauled the slop bucket to the outhouse. The rent was $35 a month.
Hank drove truck those days for a natural foods company in Boston. After a bad purchase of a rusted-out pickup, he hitchhiked back and forth until we could afford a car. I stayed at the cabin with two little kids. Fortunately, we had helpful neighbors, including the farmer who sold us firewood.
Hank typically split enough wood to last until he returned. But one time, he got caught in a snowstorm in Maine. He managed to call our neighbor Pat, so I would know. I was running out of split firewood, so she showed me how to use a maul to split the logs length-wise to size. I became quite good at it.
We were smarter about country living when years later we moved to Worthington, a hilltown in Western Mass., where we lived twenty-five years. First, we rented a funky home that was a step up from the cabin although keeping warm was a challenge. That’s Hank using a chainsaw, a tool I would never touch. Then after we built a well-insulated home, we got to the point where we could buy cords of green wood that sat for a year while we had enough dry wood from the previous year’s delivery to burn.
The dry wood was carried into the cellar and the green wood stacked outside. That’s a lot of moving, and our kids who had to help have their own stories about that chore.
In New Mexico, we burned soft wood because that was available. We only needed a cord because of the passive solar design of our home. Desert rats would make nests in the stacked logs, cleverly cutting pieces of thorny cactus they used to protect them.
But back to the present. With Hank’s help, it took a few hours spread over two days and interrupted by a rainstorm to haul the green firewood to its place in the shed. The wood to the left is ready to burn. The wood to the right will look pretty for another year. That chore’s done.
P.S. I was going to write about the exhibit of D.H. Lawrence’s nude paintings I saw in Taos, but I got distracted by this task. In the next post, I promise.