21 February 2010
 
Two Trees (and a Chainsaw)


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(The First tree missed the house, the second didn't miss the garage)
 
The sun came up this morning as a golden blob and thrust itself in the window of the master bedroom of the little farmhouse.
 
I was reluctant to get out of bed. It had been the best sleep I have had down here. I suppose that is what comes from moving a ton or two of white heavy snow. My muscles ached in a good way, from honest work, not that stress-ache that comes from whatever it is we do in Washington.
 
Last week’s efforts to dig out were worthwhile. I was able to ram the Bluesmobile all the way onto the property. I stopped at the Lowe’s in the big-box end of Culpeper and bought a couple shovels, and a bug jug of Wasp Killer to get those evil bastards before they wake up in their burrow down by the barn.
 
I shoveled to the gate, and then up to the house, finding the uneven pavers under the tightly compacted snow. Looking around as I paused marveling at how the weight of it had snapped some of the little pine trees.
 
The path to the front door was still clear where I shoveled out enough of the drift to get the door and confirm the power was on last week and the pipes had not burst.
 
A wave of snow had slid down the roof and was entangled on the little snow-studs on the green metal roof. A phenomenon that structural engineers call ‘slump,’ and the rest of us call ‘glaciers’ allowed the mass to continue to travel slowly down and over the gutter, where icicles hung and dripped down onto the bank across the porch.
 
Chill drops hit me on the head as I realized I had to shovel up and down on this mission.
 
I got the door open, breathing hard, and resolved that this was not a sprint but a marathon. I made some coffee in the little kitchen and turned on the satellite radio and turned it up loud. That is one of the nice things about farm living that is not possible at Big Pink. I haven’t blasted the music in a long time.
 
Then I went outside and attacked the gutters. Huge chunks of ice broke off and hit me and the drift on the porch with muted thuds.
 
With the gutter clear I was able to shovel off the rest of the porch.
 
Heckle showed up, meowing loudly in protest of the wet. He watched me work for a while, waiting for the shoveling to stop so that he might approach me in supplication.
 
I realized that food for him/her was a priority issue, so I finished the porch and sloshed through the house to attack the back deck and dig a path to the garage where his dry food is stored.

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I managed to get out the back door thanks to the melt from the roof, which had beat back the drift on the deck into an adamant plain of knee-high white. I started a path toward the steps, throwing snow over the railing. It was then that I realized, in addition to the medium sized pine that had collapsed across the deck, nearly missing the house, that another pine was rakishly draped across the back of the garage.
 
Shit. I didn’t remember that from last week, but maybe it was all too much to take in at one time.
 
This was a hell of a storm. They say we might get another one by the end of the week.

I shoveled on, decks and paths and barn-roof, until the last light faded toward the mountains and the mercury vapor security light came on next to the house.
 
Heckle had his food, and I was about done. I left the shovel by the back door and tracked ice into the mud room and made a substantial vodka. Then I went back to the deck and listened to the melt.
 
I promised Heckle the dry stuff was good enough for now and he could have a can of tuna in the morning, but I wasn’t going to put it out while the god-damn raccoons were going to get it.
 
Now I have to find a guy with a chainsaw.
 

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Copyright 2010 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com
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