Yesterday morning it was raining. And by that point it had been raining for about 24 hours.
And we’re talking hard, wake-you-up-from-the-noise-on-the-roof kind of rain.
So I get up, get ready for work and head out of the garage in the car. I make it about half-way down the driveway, when I discover that the top part of a tree has fallen and is now completely blocking the driveway. I mutter a few expletives and bang my fist on the steering wheel, because of course I am already running a little late and this is just not going to help.
In the least.
I get out of the car and decide that being the proud owner of too much testosterone, I’ll just drag this thing off the driveway and be on my way. The branch isn’t that big, probably two to three inches in diameter at its thickest point. So, I make my way to the base of the thing and give it a good yank.
Whereupon I almost fall right over on my pompous ass. This is not a twig, moron.
Now I walk around and over the thing–and finally I’m standing on the driveway for a moment with three key realizations apparent.
First is that I am going to have to cut this thing up a little bit to be able to move it.
Second is that I am already soaked through, despite my waterproof Columbia windbreaker and waterproof Merrill mocs.
And Third is that, yes I really am a pompous ass for not realizing this is a bigger deal than I first assumed.
This is when I walk back down the driveway and open the garage. Yes, my driveway is pretty long, as our house is set back from the street in the woods, behind two other pieces of property. So from the house itself, you don’t see the street or where this tree has fallen.
I begin looking for a good sized ripsaw that I know I have, when I take a moment to be angry at my spouse.
I’m angry because I know that on more than one occasion I’ve talked about getting a small chain saw for a situation just like the one I am in right this second. And that I was talked out of doing so. Something about chain saws being dangerous and how often would we really need one.
Well I need one now. In fact I need a thing of any kind that might cut some wood. And I’d prefer it to be powered by something other than my right arm.
My momentary blaming of my spouse passes, as I realize that I still need to deal with the three previously mentioned realizations and get on with my life. After a few minutes of equal parts searching and cursing at the state of my garage, I find a small, semi-rusted hand saw and a giant scissor-like thing that will prune small branches. I’ve since learned this tool is called a “lopper”,
I trudge back out to the disaster site, and begin to attack the problem with typical male logic and confidence.
First comes the saw, which is woefully undermatched to the job at hand. But I begin to hack back and forth at the main branch for about five minutes and make some progress through the first half of the trunk when the saw stops dead. It’s stuck in the branch–and refuses to move in any direction. More cursing ensues.
After some work, the saw come free and there are a few more attempts to saw the rest of the way through, but it just isn’t happening. Thus the sawing through the branch plan of attack is abandoned.
So I pick up the giant scissor looking “lopper” and begin to cut off smaller parts of the tree-let, thinking that if I can get it knocked down a little bit in overall size, I can take another run at dragging the thing off the driveway. As it turns out, the lopper works pretty well on smaller branches on this thing. The lopper also has this cool gear-ratchet system that allows one to keep cutting through a thick item in its jaws, much like a shark.
Yes! I am now a tree hacking shark. After some effort, I have hacked off a few smaller branches of this thing that would have challenged Paul Bunyan.
Have I mentioned that I was soaked through about five minutes into this half-hour? And that the rain appears to be coming down harder now than it was thirty minutes ago?
Well this bit of tree looks a little smaller now than it first did, and my desperation level is rising, so I figure its worth giving the dragging method another shot. I go to the base of fallen tree, only to now notice that the force at which it snapped from the main tree it was atop was pretty severe. The winds had been howling during the night, but I didn’t think it was that strong. Whatever, time to do the squat and yank position. (That sounds so much like it should be in a far racier tale than this one.)
The branch moves a little bit, enough to encourage me that it might slide right out of the way, when I realize that what I am pulling on is wedged between two still standing trees. Back to the lopper and removal of one more branch off the main branch, which should allow the damn thing to finally move.
Which it reluctantly now does, but not before causing me to do a hernia-inducing strain, reminding me that I am not the young man I once was.
Some more dragging and cursing follows, and finally the driveway is passable. So now, a completely soaked man gets in his car and backs it up to his home. A hot shower, the second one of the morning mind you, and some clean dry clothes will be necessary before going to work.
I put the two tools back in the garage as I walk through it, making a mental note that I am going to get a chain saw this weekend at the home improvement megastore–or at the very least a proper axe, so I can deal with this kind of thing a little easier in the future. I then make my way to the bathroom, peel off the clothes that are stuck to me like soggy flypaper and fire up the shower. I have just hit the hot water and am rubbing my now aching right shoulder when I open my eyes enough to look for something to wash off the copious amount of perspiration I have worked up during my little logging exercise.
And there it is. A nearly empty bottle of Axe body wash.
The irony that fills my life never ceases to amaze me.