Wind through a million needles

By Ben Olson
Reader Staff

Last week, the transition into fall was complete when I lit the first fire in our woodstove at home.

After sitting idle for months, this hunk of inert metal came alive again with the festive snaps and pops of the evening ritual. All the tedious, but welcome, tasks returned; splitting the kindling, building the fire, tending the early flames, keeping an eye on the kettle of water steaming on top, and cracking a window to achieve that cozy nirvana of fire and fresh air.

After a few nights of burning, I walked out to the woodshed to replenish my woodbox and frowned at what I saw. Instead of the neat, symmetrical stack that I’d admired all summer long, there was now a noticeable dent in the design from the logs I’d taken out already.

It’s a wonderful sensation to fill your wood bin for the winter, especially when I know that I personally dragged every piece out of the national forest. With my trusty old chainsaw, a 50-foot steel tow cable and 25-foot log choker, I dragged these magnificent dead beasts one by one from their natural habitat; swatting at bees, stinkbugs and mosquitoes; sweating so hard it poured into my eyes; and with a dumb smile on my face the whole time.

Because I don’t have an old wood truck yet — or a trailer — I use my well-seasoned 4Runner to haul them out, then stack as many rounds as I can cram inside until the roof bulges outward. At that point, I travel home, dump them in the yard, and split and stack them until the shed approaches that geometric bliss I’m looking for.

The angular butt ends are like a natural study of cubism; the organized chaos of an orderly wood stack complimenting the clean, right angles of my newly built shed.

Around the time when the stack was nearing completion, my partner Cadie started eyeing me every time I came home with another load of wood.

“OK, I think we have enough,” she said, laughing at me.

“It’s never enough!” I yelled, my bloody fist in the air.

I tried to stop, but gathering wood doesn’t just heat our home; it gets me up in the mountains and reminds me why I live here. It also keeps me sane… mostly.

A couple more loads in the backyard and Cadie’s laugh turned into a raised eyebrow. That’s when I started sneaking wood in while she was still at work, stacking rounds near the fence and covering them with a tarp — anything to feed that glorious habit. There’s no drug or drink that compares to the smell of freshly cut and split firewood.

I suppose I could fill that gap with freshly split wood from the rounds by the fence, but the shed wood is perfectly seasoned. It spent all summer baking in the heat.

Instead, I’ll have to be content with the gap in symmetry. I’ll have to live with the feeling of satisfaction I get whenever I’m about to place a log in the fire and recognize it. Like that enormous Douglas fir that I had to split in half just to fit inside my truck, with bark as thick as the palm of my hand. That was a good one. 

Working with wood, whether you’re burning or building with it, gives us a connection to this place in which we live. It binds us to the past, to these nameless men and women who made it here over a hundred years ago, before all the modern conveniences we take for granted today.

Gathering wood was a matter of survival back then, not fodder for a column I type on my $3,000 laptop.

Yet, when I’m up in the forest, hearing that gentle sigh of wind through a million needles, I do feel the connection. I feel the weight of all these trees surrounding me, and it’s the most comfortable sensation I could ask for.

If there ever is a god, it would live in the trees, I think. These noble sentries have provided us for millenia with roofs over our heads and warmth from the cold. Even this very paper in your hands was once a tree.

They give us so much, and every time I drive up to gather the dead ones in my rig, I try to remember to give them a pat on the trunk and thank them for coming home with me.

So much has changed in the world, but the simple things haven’t, and I like that.