her able hands

If a 90 horsepower wood chipper runs in a wood lot and no one is there to listen, does it make a sound?

I took this shot on Sunday afternoon, about an hour into the process. The area around the chipper looks good, but before was piled five feet high with brush, all of which is now beautiful wood chips. We all worked for about four hours, feeding the orange beast from the various piles around our two properties. Then the guys broke out their chainsaws to cut up the logs into useful sizes and move them off of the rest of the smaller pieces destined for the hopper. After that we spent a couple of hours dragging more to the staging area for the next time we fire up the beast.

I made a yummy Lentil Soup with Coconut Milk and warm spices that I came across somewhere on the internet and meant to link to, but do you think I can find it this morning? Adrienne picked up lettuce to go with the finely chopped veggies and I assembled a big salad, Tyler peeled and boiled potatoes for potato salad with golden hard-boiled eggs and we grilled marinated chicken breasts on a wood fire. Joe, Adrienne and their friend Zeb came over and we sat out on the back deck and ate, chattered about the school system, safety in this whacked out world we have to send our children out into (they don’t have kids yet, but they’re on the cusp) and then we all fell into that almost awkward, quiet food coma that comes to one after a day of back-breaking work. Even the kids were quiet, so much fresh air and sunshine. Song birds singing their evening chorus while the light drained slowly from the sky.

We cleaned up the dinner mess and made wood lot plans for next weekend. The guys walked around the properties to show Zeb which trees need trimming or have to come down. His brother is a tree guy and is bringing over a crane to take them down for us for a very reasonable price. Like half of what just one tree would cost, and he’s doing ten. Then our friend Doug is going to bring in his bulldozer and deal with the stumps. I hope we can get all of this completed by the end of May so we can get our shed built before summer is over.

The temptation to keep working almost dragged me around the yard to dig a few holes for the Comfrey plants, to put the hoses onto the rolling carts, to get all of the tools put back around the oak tree. But Sundays mean Monday is coming. Lila needed a bath. We all needed showers. And sleep. Glorious sleep.

The family who lives in front of us stayed out into the night, burning the dead vines and branches from last year’s garden and talking.

I liked hearing their voices rising above the crackling of their fire while Lila lay on her back, floating in the warm water, her hair fanned out around her dirt-covered face. She sang her alphabet and her counting by tens song. We all slept like happy farmers.

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