Spring Projects

This past weekend I opened a can of worms.  A neighbor helped me cut down three oak trees.  The trees had been damaged over the years, dead limbs and splits in the trunks meant they weren’t long for this world.  By taking them down and burning the brush, I could reclaim a garden spot.  Previous owners had a swing set and sandbox beneath the trees rendering the soil useless.  It all looked good in theory.The slow motion fall of the giants ended with a dull thud as they hit the snow.  Resembling centipedes, they stretched across the contours of the yard as we sectioned the trunks.

The smaller logs could be carried or skidded to a pile at the edge of the drive.  The larger ones would need to wait for a tractor to move them to the pile for splitting. I estimate the job will yield two to three cords of wood, almost as much as I burned this winter.

The brush piles were ringed with deep snowbanks which worked perfectly for controlling the blaze.  I burned, tended, added, burned until a deep layer of ash covered the sand. The garden spot will be augmented with horse manure and I have laid out a plan for flowers and herbs in the newly reclaimed plot.

The finished project is beautiful in my mind.  The current state is depressingly messy as the snow recedes and the yard begins to emerge.

But just as I began to despair at the scope of my undertaking, I caught sight of this fellow and had a flash of what the world must look like from his perspective.  My projects suddenly were not insurmountable.