Thankfully, we had a surge of testosterone yesterday as my husband, son and future son-in-law offered their muscle in removing the old deck, felling a tree, and digging around three nasty tree stumps. Additionally, our skidster-operating -hero-neighbor helped knock those nasty stumps out. Along with the men, my daughter wielded a mean axe and shovel, and lifted and dug as much as the guys. (After all, she is the one who rescued me in my last bright idea of demolition, when I had the playhouse wall fall on me.)
Of course, as we hacked and sawed I was reminded of the tree I took out years ago when we extended our front porch. It was such a pretty Aspen tree, and we were going to build the porch around it, keeping the shade and beauty. The day before the builder was coming to pour footers, we decided the tree had to go and that building around a tree that would soon perish was the dumbest idea ever.
So, with my husband leaving on a business trip, the builder coming the next day, I awoke that morning and decided I would cut it down myself. This is long ago enough that I still had “oomph” in these limbs and determination and stupidity in ample supply. My husband kissed me goodbye and wished me luck as he left for the airport. (He still knows not to argue certain things.)
I was doing pretty well until I happened to bind the chainsaw, get my leg up on the tree to move it, and then realize I was in a predicament with the tree probably falling on me if I moved. As I pondered what to do – because I didn’t want that tree falling on me or the house – my neighbor was coming home with his teenage son. They saw my plight, ran over, rescued me, and helped me saw the limbs to a manageable size.
I have since been “given the axe” as a lumberjack, which is just fine by me.