Specific Gratitude

Living in an urban area as I do, my firewood is almost all from yard trees taken down by services and given away by homeowners to save on disposal costs. Scrounging this way takes me to parts of the city I wouldn't visit otherwise, and leads to conversations with people I wouldn't have met. Though some were sad to lose their trees they were all glad to see the wood go, and I was glad to take it.

I store my firewood in racks that keep it in discreet bunches, each about a sixth of a cord, which is what my city-appropriate vehicle can carry easily. With the variations in species and split length I can usually remember where the contents of each section came from, so when I bring wood in to burn I often recall, out loud to my wife, the people I met while obtaining it, and she often remembers those scrounges from a year or three before too.

It's not just mulberry; it's the mulberry from the backyard of that run-down, burnt-out brick house where I met a young Asian man on a rehab crew, a recent immigrant who only spoke a little English but smiled broadly, his face covered with soot and plaster dust, and told me he liked the city and the job very much.

It's not just black locust, but the locust that I got from the attorney who was landscaping his back yard, pushing dirt around with a borrowed Bobcat after having several trees professionally dropped. He let me hand-split the wood on site, and even let me keep it there for a whole summer when I had no place to put it at home. I spent hours swinging the axe there, and he gave me a couple of slices of pizza when I took a break.

It's the white oak from the new neighbors that have become friends.

It's the ash from the former machinist, now part-time school bus driver, not earning quite enough and not quite old enough to retire.

It's the big Bradford pear from the woman who'd planted it with her now-deceased husband 25 years ago and who avoided cutting it down for another year after it dropped a heavy branch across the driveway, half-crushing a car.

Do you remember where your wood came from, when you bring it in?

 

Yes, I pretty much remember where I got my firewood. But you are way beyond that point Jon!! Develop any more of a relationship and you won't be able to burn it, know what I mean?
Seriously, I seem to remember the chunks that give me the most trouble during processing. Too big, too gnarly, too knotty, you get the pic. And then when I use them, I think Yup, this is the batch I've been saving for the -0 stretch or something like that.

 

Great post! Really makes you stop and think about all the cutting you've done

 

I get that feeling in the fall when I look at the stacks and think how far ahead I am....and then how much farther ahead I will be with a few more loads! Wood OCD?

 

What a wonderful post Jon1270 I too would add that this is exactly what makes our hoarding the definition of "a labor of love"-I can at anytime look at my current 9 cord CSS and tell you where each tree came from. While most comes from my farm, I can visually go to where I cut that tree and also what the conditions were at the time. The bit of scrounge or more so the wood that neighbors cut and need to dispose of is placed in my staging area because they know I will process it and be so very grateful for it. I tell my SO all the time, when she opines that I "chop wood" that it is so much more than that---It's my therapy, it's a passion that few understand and that alone makes me so thankful for finding this forum that is unlike any I've ever seen. Really nice and knowledgeable people who understand-period. I've concluded that with little exception, firewood hoarders make the best neighbors...you see it all the time on these pages...I'm proud to be included in this lot of nuts...Take care all and stay warm

 

Great post, I sure do remember. Apple limbs from my dads tree. Cherry and some nice cherry burls from my brothers back yard. Red oak from my brothers front yard that we watched a tree service take down. We talked saws with the crew after the work was done. We processed that tree one overcast fall day with a light flurry. That was a real nice day sipping coffee sitting on the giant limbs during a break. We were talking about letting it season.
Some black locust from my brothers neighbors yard. Large sugar maple rounds from my old neighbors trees. Elm from down the street that was misery to hand split. Soft maple from the neighbors behind us after a storm. There was quite a bit of scrounge in between. I was grateful for everything I received.

 

Now, you guys went and made my screen all blurry. You never know what stories we'll wake up to on FHC...

 

This has got to be one of the best conversations ever. Just think about all these good relations, the sharing, the giving, just reading about this makes me feel good. Thank you.

 

GREAT conversation indeed! It made me sit back in my chair and think a little bit. Lots of great times with new friends scrounging, and cutting firewood. It's a great feeling to look at those rows of CSS wood and have a smile from a memory from each and every one!

 

My son always turns firewood work into fun. All these posts about memories made me think of this pic... lot of gratitude from ole dad too...

 

Jon1270,
Great post!!! As I have maybe stated on this site but it is not all about the wood it is about the relationships making the firewood that it makes. I have met here and in person many great people who I have been allowed to take their tree to make something of it that is useful. Namely heat for my home or shop.

 

I don't remember specifically where every split came from, but I know that generally speaking, certain splits came from a certain place, and that those stacks of Red Maple came from either here on my place or from my SisIL's woods.
I got some hard Maple from the front yard of the house my oldest was buying on land contract (it's all gone now), and I usually remember which yard or part of my property the pine came from.
There's a particular camaraderie among wood hoarders. We get it. I didn't until I really got into burning wood for a while.
Although I generally cut by myself, there are some memories I have of cutting and processing firewood with others that are very vivid.
The first is when we moved up here. My brother made sure that he and my nephews came over and helped me get a whole bunch of wood set up next to the front porch before it got cold and snowy. I didn't understand at the time.....he did.
Whatever you can do....no matter how simple and insignificant it might seem at the time.......pay it forward.

 

Great topic. I have often thought back to where some of my wood comes from as I'm dragging it into the house. Such nice memories.

Red oak from my BIL's where I got my truck stuck in his backyard. Had to get a tow truck with over 400' of cable to winch me out. The ruts are still slightly visible. Also the memory of drinking beers on a 95 degree day while fixing those ruts.

A few big ash trees from a friends hunting cabin. They were used as backstops for our shooting range probably before I was born and were in danger of falling on the newly built cabin. Dropped two without a hitch. The third had a huge pucker factor. Big back lean towards the cabin, had it cabled but it decided to spin on the stump and head towards the cabin on its descent. Came away with only a few branches ever so gingerly making contact with the roof.

Apple tree from a friends backyard. Remember eating pies made from the apples when I went over there as a young kid. His mom remembers generations before eating pies from the apples from the same trees.

Beautiful black walnut that my dad and I found washed up on our beach. Dulled a lot of chains and drank a lot of beer on that one.

Really good people in the burning community make for great memories. Glad to be a part of it.

 

Great posts here. It is good to be reminded that getting wood to heat your home can also warm your heart.

 

"it decided to spin on the stump and head towards the cabin on its descent"... that had me breaking into a sweat just reading that...

 

Great post! Hoarding in the Buddhist tradition...

 

I'm sure Levi and his 4 sons were sweating a bit too. We had the Amish up on the roof finishing up the fascia. We used the old angle, distance, eye height trick to measure the tree height and had it pegged to just clear the house, pretty accurate I guess.