Month: November 2007

We finally got a little snow.

Today on my walk, I met an interesting man. He was trying to hitch a ride into town but he walked with me for a couple of miles. He has a vehicle, but neither it nor he has been licensed since 2004, so he drives it down to the little store and hitch hikes the 25 miles to town. He is an old hippie that has been living out here for 30 years. There are lots of old hippies out here. They sport hippie names, (like a trail name but for a hippie.) Many of them came thirty years ago and still don’t have a well, phone or electricity.

This guy had a cabin but his cabin burnt down a few years ago. After his cabin burnt down, his dog and he had to spend the winter in a tent he bought at Wal-Mart. It gets to -20 F (-29C) out here.  He said he got sick when he was living in the tent. The next year he framed a 10×12 cabin and covered it in plastic. Now, he has walls and windows, but still no door.

He told me about his buddy that lived in a cave out here until one day he went out wood cutting and a tree fell on him. They didn’t find him for a week or two.

I think I know why Thoreau only spent two years at his cabin; after two years, things seem routine. There is no adventure to it. The first winter I spent here was exciting because I didn’t know what being snowed in and living without running water would be like. I would wake up in my cold cabin and feel kind of burly as I made the fire. I would jump around to get warm while I waited for the fire to warm the cabin up. I still wake up when my cabin hits 36 degrees but it just doesn’t feel that cold anymore.

Last winter I got the phone line and discovered blogging.

This winter doesn’t offer anything new. This winter seems a little boring and tame. There are things to work on, like: my diet, exercise, writing, meditation, etc. The same stuff I’m always working on.

As I was driving home this year, I thought, if my cabin were robbed, I would go somewhere. When there was a big windstorm, I thought, “If a tree falls on my cabin, I’ll just get a ticket to somewhere and go.� I’m always threatening that if I run out of wood I’ll get a ticket to somewhere, grab my pack, and take off. I’m sensing a lack of commitment to this winter.

Once the snow gets here, maybe I’ll feel more committed and settled.

The first time I noticed a Gray Jay, was when I moved to North Central Washington. They came right up to me–like I was in a Disney movie. I mentioned to someone that these birds don’t seem to have any fear of people, and they nodded and said “Yeah, they’ll take food right out of your hand.”

One morning, high up a pass in the North Cascades, I woke up on a wide section of trail that I had decided was as far as I could go the night before. Lying in my bag, looking out at the glorious view and the morning sun, I reach into my food sack and pulled out a bar for breakfast. As I unwrapped it, a Gray Jay lighted by me. Even though I don’t approve of feeding animals, I held a piece of my bar between my fingers; it hopped on over and took it. Then two others showed up. One landed on my pack that was laying next to me; we finished off the bar together. When the bar was gone, so were they.

I would really like a pet for the winter but I know as soon as spring comes a pet will tie me down. My son suggested I try to make friends with a wild bird.

I worry about putting out a feeder because I don’t want to attract rodents and bears. But maybe I’ll buy some feed and see how it goes. One website has this to say about Gray Jays: “Trusting and easily tamed, the Gray Jay is good company for people in lonely places.”

In the spring I put out eggs for the ravens. They swoop my cabin when they want one. But they are stealthy, once I put the eggs out. We are a long way from becoming friends but a gray jay is your friend right away.

When I came home, this year, there was a Grey jay coming around to my cabin but I didn’t feed it so it left. Maybe it will give me a second chance.

Whoa! As I was writing this, I put out a little bread on my picnic table that sits on my porch. Now a Raven is swooping around my cabin, yelling. If it takes the bread, that will be as close as it has ever come to my cabin. Those ravens always know what is going on.

Finally, I’m getting into cutting wood. I brought two truck loads back from my upper property yesterday. I cut most of it in to long pieces so that at least I can get it to my cabin where I can cut it up at my leisure.

The wind storm brought down another big dead pine tree–probably 200 years old– and, again, that tree is laying right along side of the road– The wood cutting goddess is shining on me this year.

Those long pieces are heavy and I end up using my whole body to push them around and get them into my pickup. As a result my legs have bruises and knots all over them. I’m also pretty sore but I have the wood cutting passion burning in me and I can’t wait till daylight to get working on my wood pile.

I think I’ve cut about as much as I did last year, but last year most of my wood was fir and tamarack and this year most of my wood will be pine; pine burns a lot faster.

I like the branches best because the wood seems harder than the trunk of the tree and I don’t have to split them. Big pine rounds are difficult to split. A lot of people around here have wood splitters. I use my twisty wedge and a sledge hammer.

I’m thinking of stacking my wood because then I could tell more accurately how much I have… but I know that when you stack it, it doesn’t look like that much and it can be discouraging.

Down at my mailbox, yesterday, the UPS guy drove by and said he left a package for me at the store. Going from my Mailbox to the store adds another 2 miles to my already 5 mile long walk and I wanted to get back to my cabin and watch the movies that Netflix had sent me– plus it was cold–so I left getting the package for another day.

Walking back, I thought about the call from the wood cutting gentleman. I started thinking about putting my chainsaw and all of it’s accouterments away for the winter.

My neighbor pulls up and asks me if I have seen my upper property since the wind storm. She said her husband wanted her to ask me to cut some of the trees down on my property that they were afraid would fall down and block the road.

I don’t really like falling trees… I’m always afraid that they may fall on me, but I said, ” Yeah, I’ll go do that right away.” So I finished my walk, changed into my soot covered wood cutting clothes, took all the stuff out the back of my pickup, filled the chainsaw with gas and oil and drove up to top of my property.

Running a chainsaw, and falling trees is probably not something you should do when you’re thinking, “I just want to get this done and get back to my warm cabin and watch some DVDs.” Sawdust kept getting in my eyes because I forgot my safety glasses. One of the trees I fell, got stuck in another tree’s branches and I had to keep shaking it to try and get it to fall.    I was lucky to make it back without injury..

After the big wind storm there are lots of seasoned trees down, right next to the road, and since the wood cutting gentleman didn’t call last night like he said he would, I should probably keep cutting.

Cutting wood has got to be one of the hardest, most unprofitable ways to make a living, at least around here. Around here, wood goes for $85- $140 dollars a cord and that’s split and delivered. That’s a whole lot of work and expense for not much money.

So, I find this guy’s number in the local free classifieds, saying he has some wood for sale. I call him and he talks to me for about ten minutes saying that he doesn’t own a chainsaw but if he can buy or borrow one he will get some wood to sell me. He tells me about how he is homeless and has kids and that they are staying with friends until they can get their own place.

That was about 3 weeks ago. Then last night, just before dark, he calls me and says he has a load of wood. At first, I don’t know who it is and he says, “I’m the gentleman that listed wood for sale in the classifieds.”

I say, “Great, bring it on over.”

He asks me where I live and I tell him. But he is fifty miles away.

I said, “I thought you lived around here.” and he says, ” Yeah, I do, but I cut this load of wood for someone else in a different town and they aren’t home and I don’t have enough money to buy gas to get home.”

I say, “Well, just park at an intersection with a “for sale” sign out. This time of year lots of people are looking for wood to buy.”

For some reason he puts me on three way calling with his mom and dad. Finally, the dad says he will loan his son some gas money till he gets paid for the wood. But the guy decides to see if he could sell it in town or maybe wait for the guy he was supposed to sell it to, to come home.

He says that he will go get me some wood on Thursday. I tell him that it may snow by then. He said, “That’s why we are hoping it won’t.”