“Are you crazy?”
“Yes,” I say. No hesitation. I think the blunt reply throws him off a little. I stand straight as we speak, the conversation interrupting my rhythm. In the darkness I’m working at shaving off a couple of layers of the split wood from the back of my wood pile, lobbing the pieces over the forward layers into a great pile in the snow before I start stacking it for easy access in the red barn shed. I’ve already burnt up all the wood I piled in there in November, at least a cord, and tonight, with all the wood gone this afternoon, it's time to resupply.
“It’s minus 20 out here. What the hell are you doing splitting wood in this weather?”
“I’m on a roll, and I’m warm enough,” I say, smiling.
“And crazy,” he mutters into the breath cloud mushrooming out in front of him.
Pioneer Paul lives across the road on a bit of a diagonal from me, and he has been my chimney-watcher as I burn up copious amounts of wood and make the usual rookie mistakes. He was the one to alert me when the creosote from the burning was building up in my chimney, and he helped me knock a pile of it out of the pipe leading from my stove; the slow burn all day while I’m at school is apparently not good for soot buildup. Makes sense now that I know about it. Since then I make sure to burn the fire on high at least once a day to clear the pipes out of the little bits of buildup that get caught when it burns slow and smokey all day.
Tonight he came over to shine his flashlight at the pitch-laden icicles dripping from the top of my chimney.
“Know what that is?”
“No,” I say, knowing I’m about to find out. "Icicles?"
“It’s pitch. Yesterday you must have burned green wood, and that there is all the sap from it. You gotta make sure you’re burning the dry stuff, cuz those drops’ll drip right off, get red hot and drip off right onto your roof.”
“Geez. Not good,” I say, pausing and looking at the beam of light hovering over the drips of wax-like gunk hanging from the rim of my round aluminum chimney. The strange smell in the air yesterday and today is no longer a mystery.
"Not good at all. You don't want that kind of burning sensation," he says.
"No kidding. Personally I don't think I want to experience any kind of burning sensation," I reply dryly. "Thank goodness I have you here keeping an eye on things or I’d burn the house down!” I add, meaning every word about both the burning sensations and the neighbourly help.
“Well, I heard you out here splitting wood and I thought I better come on over and say something, but don’t you worry, it’ll be okay with that stuff I hear you splitting. I can tell just by the sound of the wood, and I can hear that all the stuff you’ve got here is good and dry. You just burn that and you’ll be okay,” he looks over the hay-stacked pile of logs at his feet.
“Yup. This is all good stuff. You got some pine, got some fir. The fir’s real good, so burn that if you got it. Burns twice as long as the other stuff. And don’t you worry, I’ll keep an eye out for ya.”
“Thanks so much Paul. I really appreciate it.”
“Don’t you worry, I was once just learning too, we’re all just learning up here.
I better get going though. It’s frigging FREEZING out here, and you’re crazy and I got no gloves on.”
And with that the beam of light that saw him in leads him back out, and I hear him slip a little and mutter something about how frigging cold it is as he heads up the driveway towards his own waiting fire.
An hour later and my wood is re-stocked, nice dry rounds that’ll burn for a good long while through the cold nights. It was -27 this morning, although that’s nothing compared to the -57 experienced by our school’s northern pen pals in Lower Post, BC. It’s BC’s most northern school, and my students have been participating in an email correspondence with the students of the one-room school since the start of the year. I was hoping to take a school field trip up there to meet them all, but the logistics of getting approval to fly are crazy, and the drive itself is an unimaginable thirty hours. I do love these kids, but thirty hours ONE WAY in a car with them is just undoable. It would make me crazier than I already am, possibly irreparably so. Instead I’m hoping to take them down to Vancouver at some point, if they’re good, of course (haha), but that’s an easier trip to plan so I can let the idea percolate for a couple more months.
The fire is on full blast now that I am back up to a fully stocked supply in the easy-access shed. Full blast means that the back flap is open all the way to let in maximum air. It’s warm in here now that I am not conserving my supply of readily-available burnables, so warm that I had a shower instead of my usual evening bath. I am now settling down to a nice tea with a dollop of local honey sourced by Lillooet’s own Bob the honey guy. I’ve always bought it from the Lillooet Buy Low grocery store, but got a tip that I can just knock on Bob’s door next time thanks to Bob the Conservation Officer who I ran into in the grocery store line-up. I am totally in love with small towns!!! Maybe I’ll pay a visit to Bob to see if we can do a field trip for the kids in the spring to see how he collects all the honey!
Oh, and by the way, the grizz has apparently made his way off into the wilderness well beyond the edges of town. I came back from my Christmas trip to find that he had been back on the prowl for a couple of weeks over the holidays, and he continued to make heavy use of my yard. He stuck around town for another week at the start of January before following the tracks of an injured wolf out of town. I guess it looks like someone shot the wolf in the leg, and the wound must be festering and smelly, the perfect come hither meal scent to drag a hungry bear out of here. It's been almost two weeks since anyone last saw him, so I doubt he'll be back before spring.
The mouse seems to have moved out on its own accord as well. I put out the live trap which remained un-tripped for a couple of days, and I have not seen any mouse signs around since I set it up. Fingers crossed the little bugger moved elsewhere.
So now it's just me, the fire, my tea, and the clack of typing across a glowing keyboard. Have a sweet night! ;)
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