#42 - Tiiiimmmmmbbeeeerrrrrrr!!! - July 14, 2012

[Once again, Blogger uploads these with the wrong orientation.  My apologies.]

I woke up this morning ready to go. I caught up on some blogging, and when I heard my landlord get up, I asked him about the plan for the tree for today. He said his friend would be over in a few minutes. I hung out a bit, we talked about stuff, and then we went in the back when Jerry showed up. The tree was a 40’ tall maple. About 4’ off the ground, it split into 3 trunks, 2 of them in his neighbor’s yard, and 1 that overhung his yard. Today’s task was to try to get the one that overhung his yard down into the yard. That was the goal. Anything beyond that would be gravy.

Jerry scoped the tree. It looked hard to get into, but we pulled the extension ladder out. At its full height, the ladder touched the trunk just a few feet below where it would make sense to stand and cut the upper branches down. Jerry climbed up, pronounced that it looked pretty easy from where he was, and asked for a chain saw. My friend held the ladder, and I carried a 2-ft chainsaw up the ladder. It was probably the most serious case of vertigo I’d had. The ladder was not convincingly against the tree, and I was acutely aware of the extra 35 lbs around my belly I carried as well as the chainsaw.

But I did it. I gave him the chainsaw and carefully went back down the ladder.

Once I was on the ground, Jerry fired up the chainsaw and started to cut. He is an artist with the chainsaw. He takes care of smaller branches to clear his way, then, like spreading frosting on a cake, he cuts the larger branches. He cut the upper branch from the bottom. We were worried it would hit the house. Because he cut a notch in the bottom first, the branch swung down instead of out, and missed the house by 5 or 10 feet.

In just a couple minutes he was done. The trunk rose 20’ in the air, but the top 20’ was in the yard. He had ridden the tree like a bull in a rodeo as it rose and bucked when the weight of the leafy branches fell off. He was “shaking like a leaf” he said. Standing up there with no rope or harness and a running chainsaw. It was one of the gutsiest things I’ve ever seen.

We tossed him up an extension cord. He tied the chainsaw to it and lowered it down. We reset the ladder to a more stable location and he climbed down, happy to be on the ground. A few minutes later, he cut a notch in the base of the trunk, and my friend and I ran for it. The trunk followed swiftly. Suddenly, we had a log instead of a tree.

I went into town and ran some errands in preparation for tomorrow (because I have to move out of the room in the morning, and go get my family in Queens), and when I got back some of the tree had been chopped up. For the rest of the day, off and on, we worked on the tree. I used the chainsaw a bit, he used it, we cut and hauled and stacked. Jerry came back eventually, after we had thought we were stuck because one chainsaw wouldn’t start and the other’s chain came off. He got the chain back on, and we went back to work, the three of us making solid progress. Soon enough, the work for the day was done. Wood needed to be hauled away, and some neighbors asked if he was giving it away. He said he was.

With that, the day was over. I did my last load of laundry at the house, packed up my suitcase, and headed off to dreamland. Tomorrow I bring my family home. We close on the house on Wednesday. The end of this road is almost here.

A friend's band was playing at a local restaurant, the Rambler's Rest.  Great venue, great food.  Good band.  I ate dinner, but I was beat.  I didn't stay long.  Here is Guy's Night Out (the name of the band).