Zen and the Art of Firewood Maintenance

We burn a lot of firewood around here.  I thought it would be fun to see if I could make burning wood even remotely humourous or poignant.  At the conclusion of this car wreck I’m not really sure what I accomplished but what the hell, it was fun.

With me being at home now we go through about 15 face cords a year.  I used to buy all my firewood.  This caused a bit of a paradox in the complicated folds of my wee mind.  Somehow I saw this as reducing the sustainability of the whole thing.  Obviously I would still be using far less electricity to fire the furnace if I’m burning wood, purchased or not.  But the idea of buying wood from what is effectively a wood factory kind of bugs me.  I understand that these guys probably manage their wood lots well, taking down only appropriate trees in order to keep the lot healthy.  It’s just that this leaves too many opportunities for unquestionable practices.  Yes, believe it or not this shit actually goes through my head.  So now it’s not just greed capitalist that can’t be trusted but Gaston Tranche Montagne from out back of Poltimore, who can’t be counted on to take down a tree properly.

God, I hope I’m not turning into a conspiracy theorist.  It’s recently been pointed out that I’m becoming a lot more reclusive out here.  I’m not so sure this is a good sign.  A buddy of mine told me on the phone the other day that I’m turning into Ted Kaczynski.  Don’t fret though; my revolution remains a peaceful one – we’re only building love bombs here baby!

Buying firewood is expensive too.  This year they want $110 a face cord.  That’s over $1,500 a year (figured that out in my head).  Now, as I indicated, I would rather put the money up the chimney than on the electrical grid, but considering that’s what I pay for heat and hydro (not including wood) for an entire year, it’s a pretty considerable sum.  Hydro and beer are really the only two financial benefits there are to living in Quebec.  Somehow this seems ironic.  I don’t know why but it does. 

As I’m surrounded by nothing but trees I decided this year I was going to cut almost all of my wood myself.   I’ve always cut a portion of my supply but this year was going to be different.

Here’s a surprise.  I’m going to take a moment to chase a tangent down a rabbit hole.   Please bear with me.  I swear I’m not making this shit up.  Big Brother is apparently running out of things to regulate.  Picture in your mind a Canadianized version of 1984, with Winston at his desk at the Ministry of Truth sifting through the minutia of captured firewood information.  He discovers a word still written in Oldspeak and the next thing you know Big Brother eradicates yet another obvious source of treachery.  Yes, our Canadian bureaucracy is attempting to rid the country of the dreaded system of measurement for stove-wood sale and purchase – “the cord”.   How can we go on as a civilized people knowing this roguish cowboy system of measurement is out there taunting us?  What kind of a subversive came up with this arbitrary idea of stacking firewood into 48”x96”x48” piles in the first place?  It’s bloody treason is what it is.  Then if that wasn’t enough then this terrorist, realizing he hadn’t wreaked enough havoc and confusion, went and introduced more subterfuge in the form of “the face cord”.  Somebody prep Room 101! 

I can’t wait to someday call up Gaston Tranche Montagne from out back of Politmore and ask him to send me 20- “stacked cubic metres” of hardwood.

Anyway - now back to our story… 

I love the heat thrown by a wood-burning device.  When you come in from outside you tangibly walk into it, it’s so real.  The warmth is so thorough it’s almost visible.  Inconsistency plays a big part in its beauty.  The quantitative nature of heat supplied by a modern furnace is emotionless.  It’s empirical and mathematical.  It’s a cold ephemeral heat devoid of any character and it fails to create any ambience.  Wood heat has vast idiosyncrasy and character to it.  It’s too hot at the source and it’s cool at the fringes.  It’s gnarly, unruly and difficult to control.  Only with experience does one learn to understand and use it effectively.  Maybe it’s because it's heat derived from what once was alive that gives it this emotive quality.  I don’t want to over-dramatize it (probably a little late for that right?) but it truly does have magical properties.  It takes inert things and turns them into a heat source. The floor, the curtains, couch, table or rug, virtually everything in the house absorbs the energy and then emits it outward.

To utilize wood heat effectively you need a cavalier attitude toward the fuel itself.  In order for a house full of innate items to achieve this mystical transformation you need to aggressively throw fuel at it.  You can’t allow fuel conservation to creep into the back of your mind.  The spell starts with dampers wide open and the fire burning as hot as it can for as long as it takes for the conjuring to happen.  Never let the fire burn down, always maintain a plentiful red-hot pile of coals in the stove.  When new fuel is tossed in it should almost burst into flame, it should certainly ignite as soon as the doors are closed and the damper is opened fully.

It’s taken me a long time to understand the complexity of wood heat.  I’ve always been too concerned with my wood supply to burn for utmost efficiency.  Now that I get it though, damn it takes a lot of fuel and therein lays my supply dilemma.

I take down only dying trees, when I do take one down.  What I usually do is take deadfall.  Obviously you must find trees that are at their optimum state and not long into the rotting process.  There must be clear definitive grain to the wood - this indicates integrity.  If the saw throws chunks and not dust then you’re good.  The level of investment is the same to stack a punkie piece of firewood, as it is to stack one that will burn effectively.  At my age this investment is showing just how finite a resource it is.  It’s always a special experience pulling this sack of meat, bone and fluid out of bed the day after firewood foraging.  I’ll expand on this a little later.

A wise and grizzled old friend, who I let disappear from my life, once told me that if I was going to cut my own wood, I had better enjoy the process.  He said that by the time a stick of firewood is thrown into the stove, it would have been physically handled twelve times.  I never actually counted the steps until now.

But before we get down to the standard operating procedures let’s talk tools.  Man I love tools.  When you have a well-maintained piece of equipment in your hands - well, it’s a beautiful damn thing.  It makes me emotional just thinking about it.  I don’t know why I feel this way.  I guess it’s some kind of hunter-gatherer thing for me.  This is clear indication that I remain deeply in touch with both sides of my sexual spectrum.

My List of Firewood Foraging Items: 

Item 1:  Stihl chainsaw (I don’t know if this is true or not but I’ve heard that apparently they make other brands)

Item 2:  Sharpened spare chain

Item 3:  Sharpening file

Item 4:  Wedges.  These rather benign little things are worth their weight in gold once the saw gets stuck in the tree.  Regardless of one’s ability, it is best to realize that this is a certainty and not an eventuality.  This will happen at some point in the process.  Even if you possess (as I do, I should mention) a ninja-like ability with the saw in your hands and you believe (as I do, I should mention) you’re a tree whisperer with a God-like ability (I’ll stay clear of this one) to breath in an innate understanding of the tree, its life experience, death weight, pressure points and a full physical and philosophical comprehension of the concept of a fulcrum - THIS WILL HAPPEN!  Oh and you will swear and swear and swear when it does.

Here’s a little thing I like to do in this particular instance.  I turn off the saw and once I’m satiated and the final utterance has left my mouth, I stand back and take in a deep breath.  In effort to reinvigourate the moment, I intently listen for the final echo of my soliloquy of curses.  It is possible to still hear it.  Then I picture how ridiculous the moment must look from out of body, cursing like a madman in the middle of the bush all by myself.  After a chuckle I’ll move on to the task at hand. 

Item 5:  Spark plug wrench/slot screwdriver combination tool.  Do not leave this tool on the workbench in the garage at home.  You will regret doing this.  Forgetting this will lead to a long walk or ride home during which you will swear a lot.

Item 6:  Combination jerry can with appropriately mixed gasoline and chain oil.

Item 5:  Eye protection – initially to be worn at all times.  Eventually to be cast off one’s face without any regard to possible repercussions due to the frustration of not being able to see detail, especially in the flat light of the winter.  Cursing and swearing while doing this aids in the full experience.

Item 6:  Ear protection – See note above except insert the following in the appropriate place, ….of the constant and consistent pressure being applied to one’s jawbone and the inability to hear anything around you.

Item 7:  Recently purchased work boots with appropriate ASTM rating for safety or depending on the cutting season; comfy worn sneakers or comfy worn winter boots.

Item 8:  Chaps.  Who am I kidding; I don’t even own a pair.

Item 9:  Splitting maul

Item 10:  Axe

I pilfer most of my wood from lots around me that I don’t own (if you’re a neighbour and you’re reading this, I would never go on your property) and because I am seriously lacking in the necessary automated equipment to harvest wood really effectively, I find it necessary to take down trees or locate deadfall within a reasonable proximity to the road.  I estimate reasonable proximity at somewhere around 150’.  You want to keep it relatively close, as it’s about to become the craziest damn workout one can get.  It’s kind of a combination clean and jerk caber toss that is repeated over and over.  This vessel of bone and guts I carry myself around in is about to get really, really sore.   But it’s a good sore.  Actually…no that’s a lie; it’s not a good sore at all.

This is the kind of sore it is.  I played high-school football; well actually I played high-school football a little but I sat on the bench and had a really good view of my teammates playing high-school football a lot.  I loved it though.  Many years later and many years ago, somehow my brother Dan got his hands on a bunch of football equipment.  One of the schools in the area had given up its program and Dan got a hold of all their gear.  Well we thought it would be a great idea to get a gang of guys out and play real football again.  I think we did it twice but the first time was the most fun I’ve ever had playing a sport.  I played a little quarterback and a little wide receiver that day.  I recall laying out for one pass in particular and when my body hit the ground and every pound of air left my system, I remember thinking, between the most incredibly violent contractions and compressions of my ribcage, how do the guys in the NFL bounce up from this play after play.  Anyway, when I woke up the next morning I really and truly could not move.  I know people say this all the time after doing something they’re not used to but I really could not move.  It was like gravity had exponentially increased in strength overnight.  In fact it was the first time I truly understood the idea of gravity as a magnetic force.  It felt as though I was being sucked through my bed and once the momentum caught me I would be squeezed through the strata layers and wouldn’t stop until I was abruptly slammed into the earth’s core.  This is the kind of sore that firewood foraging will provide.  Oh and this makes you swear a lot too.

My List of SOP’s Involved in the Forest-to-Stove Process:

Step 1:    Take down tree

Step 2:    Block in carry-able log lengths

Step 3:    Cart lengths to road (touch 1)

Step 4:    Chuck lengths to shoulder of road (touch 2)

Step 5:    Load lengths onto machine for transportation (touch 3)

Step 6:    Drive machine to pre-processing area

Step 7:    Unload log and carry to processing area (touch 4)

Step 8:    Block log

Step 9:    Pick up block (touch 5)

Step 10:  Split block

Step 11:  Chuck split sticks into pre-pile (touch 6)

Step 12:  Chuck pre-pile into lean-too (touch 7)

Step 13:  Stack sticks into storage piles (touch 8)

Step 14:  Chuck sticks into wheelbarrow and wheel to garages (touch 9)

Step 15:  Stack sticks into garage storage (touch 10)

Step 16:  Collect sticks into daily wood storage devices (touch 11)

Step 17:  Throw stick on fire (touch 12)

As well as a damn good workout and an awesome opportunity for solitary swearing, I find firewood foraging to be meditative.  I guess firewood just happens to be my motorcycle.  (This is in reference to the title of this never-ending spew.  Oh and this is the equivalent of having to explain a punch line).  There’s something about the systematic-ness of it, the fact that it is a process that momentarily clears me from the disorientation and confusion of life on this absurd orb we’re flying on.  It is truly an existential experience.  Maybe it’s the aloneness of being in the woods, the quiet undisturbed nature of it all.  Even the carbon stench and the cacophonous bark of the chainsaw is not enough to lessen the effects; in fact it’s the contrary.  I find each step in the process to be remarkably fulfilling.  I oftentimes wonder if it’s just a testament to how anal I am or how closely I orbit the planet OCD that it makes me feel the way it does.  But when the wood is concisely stacked in any of the wood shelters I have around the place, well I liken it to a third eye experience when I’m meditating.  I can sit there forever looking at my accomplishment, feeling centered and at one with the quality of the experience I’ve just had - the reward cigar and pint notwithstanding.