I {heart} hydraulics

They say wood warms you twice – once while you're cutting it, and once while you're burning it. In my case this weekend I would add: "and once when you spend four hours standing in front of a hot engine exhaust, operating the log splitter."

We picked it up early in the morning, as soon as the equipment rental place opened. The unit we got looked more or less like this, only yellow and a little bit beefier. That vertical piece at the front is the blade. To use it, you lie a section of wood on the long horizontal part with the grain end against the blade, then push the handle and the hydraulic arm pushes the wood slowly, firmly and relentlessly into the blade until it splits into two pieces.

(As an aside – we stopped at the Starbuck's across the road from the equipment warehouse, something I have done only once before in my life, and I have to report that everything we ordered was utterly disappointing. Mr. A's coffee was watery and acidic, my decaf latte was as bland as warm tan milk, and the texture of the baked goods was all wrong – the pumpkin "scone" was more like a damp triangular muffin with too much sticky frosting, and the chocolate in my chocolate croissant was grainy and overly sweet, with tough pastry and a day-old feeling in my mouth. It was so inadequate I didn't even finish eating it, and that's saying a lot. I ended up feeling semi-giddy after the experience, though, upon realizing that what it really means is that I've succeeded in training my palate to accept only really wonderfully made, healthy, delicious fresh food. And in finding a place to live where that kind of food is plentiful and easy to find.)

So we got home with the splitter and drove it out into the back field, where we unhooked the trailer as close to the woodpile as we could get and started piling up rounds of wood to be split. I'd been envisioning that long trunk of eucalyptus that fell out of one of our trees last winter, and had somehow forgotten that there was actually about a cord and a half of white oak and various other salvaged mystery wood piled up back there, which Mr. A had been given by someone he met at the Christmas tree lot last year who had just finished cutting up a downed oak on his property and didn't have the time to split it up before moving it out of the way for some other project. Or something like that – I wasn't there for that part. Anyway, the wood was free and there was a lot of it, but it was all in large, odd-sized sections. The biggest piece we had was a little over two feet across and almost three feet long – a very heavy, solid chunk of oak.

The first couple of years I lived here I was in a house that had no furnace, so I got pretty good at wielding a maul. That first winter I split probably around a cord myself (not including what was already there, and what my ex-husband split) and came to really enjoy that kind of work. You're outside in the cool fresh air doing something useful and necessary, the colors and textures of the wood are beautiful and various, the wood itself smells wonderful, and when you're done you know you just got a really great workout.

I'm going to guess that working by hand it would've taken me several weeks to split up all the wood we did in about four hours this weekend. I had the easy job – operating the splitter. Mr. A and his brother staged the pile, loaded the splitter, and threw the split pieces onto a new pile that we'll be stacking over the next few weeks (I didn't get the other pile re-stacked, either, so now I have two to do). It wasn't as much of a five-senses kind of experience as splitting logs by hand, but there was something strangely satisfying about seeing that machine just effortlessly break an enormous hunk of hard wood into two perfect sections. I liked watching the way the different kinds of wood split, too. White oak has a very straight, tight grain and snaps into clean, even pieces the way a Triscuit breaks when you bend it. Eucalyptus is softer and stickier and more likely to have weird swirls and knots inside that cause it to twist in the splitter or splinter into bizarre, ruffle-edged shapes. Other kinds, I don't even know what they were – possibly some redwood and various kinds of fir and pine, which I don't mind burning along with the hardwoods sometimes, just to get things started.

Anyway. Firewood. I love doing this kind of work and am looking forward to stacking it now, and of course to having our first fire of the year. Usually that happens in October.

I didn't get any sewing done but I did filter the honey, twice. I didn't find out until Saturday that it's supposed to sit for a week or so after filtering and before bottling, so that the air can work its way out. I took some pictures of the honey going through the filter, which causes it to move into beautiful bubbles and swirls. I'll post those if any of them turn out.

Other upcoming tasks: Going to the first day of the beekeeping class at the community college and begging to be let in even though enrollment is already full. Putting together a bee sting first aid kit to keep with the rest of the beekeeping supplies at the community garden. Washing all the bottles for the honey. Designing labels for the front and back of the bottle, so we can sell it at the Saturday morning market. Looking into one more form of "hobby agriculture" that I can try at home this year – either chickens again, or possibly a couple of goats. Buying lumber for the studio and figuring out how to build it. Finishing and mailing those aprons I promised everyone.

It's funny. Sometimes (a lot of the time) I look at my lists of unfinished tasks and think, "Man, I must be the laziest person in the world!" Just lately though a new thought is starting to occur to me instead: "Wow, I am attempting to do an awful lot here!" Frequently now I even remember to give myself appropriate credit for what I've accomplished, instead of only feeling guilty for not doing more.

It feels good to see that attitude changing in myself. There's always going to be more to do.

P.S. Tater is fine – I guess it was just his paw again after all. Also, the boots are perfect, just what I needed. Durable, comfortable right out of the box and no laces for twigs and foxtails to get caught in.