Wood for Woody

The wood train!

A very nice thing happened to Kim and I this weekend. While I was away at a Christian Men's retreat with my three brothers a huge load of wood was delivered and stacked in my woodshed. The shed is now full with approximately 5 and 1/2 cords. This is more than enough to make it through the winter. As a Rotarian, I have participated in community service many times. Beautification of the Loyalton Main Street, irrigating the city park, clean up along highway 49 to name a couple. However, this last weekend I was the recipient of the volunteer service. So here's the story.

Kevin Maneuvers his trailer

After my month long stay in the hospital last July, I came home weak as a kitten. While my recovery has been rapid (if I do say so myself) I have been in no condition to undertake the annual task of filling the woodshed for the winter. My old Homelite chain saw (about 32 years old) weighs so much it was beyond my prescribed lifting limit even if I had the physical stamina to attempt wood cutting. There was no way I could do it, and it was obvious to my friends in the Portola Rotary club.

President Hi-Ho and
President Ann

They put together a little project to supply my winter wood. One Rotarian, Bill Tantau, had cleared some trees from his property and had logs available to cut and process into firewood. My non-Rotarian friend (current District Ranger of the Sierraville Ranger District) Quentin Youngblood pitched in with Bill and others to cut the logs into rounds. Then over the next several weeks, Rotarians and others pecked away at the huge pile of rounds and split it into stove wood.

Last weekend I was out of town as I mentioned, but the Portola club invited my club (Loyalton) to help deliver and stack the wood. So, at around 9:00 am a fleet of pickups (Three plus a dump trailer) came rumbling down France Road to our driveway. The Presidents of both Loyalton (Hi-Ho) and Portola (Ann Taylor) led the charge. They quickly organized all the worker bees, while Kevin LaPlant expertly guided his huge dump trailer into position by the cavernously empty wood shed. He dumped the load (pardon the expression) and they all set to work. They used the old "bucket brigade" method to move the wood from the dumped pile, or the pickup bed, into the woodshed. Incidentally this is the same method hotshot crews use to move fire-line debris away from the freshly constructed line....I'm just sayin!

The "Bucket Brigade".

The work crew included Dave Gentry, Steve Clifton, Ralph and Ann Taylor, and Kevin LaPlant from Portola with Hi-Ho (Marie Silver), and Slack Jaw (Jeff Torrason) on the team from Loyalton. Of course Lucy and Kim pitched in to help as well. It took a while for Lucy to get the sleep out of her eyes, but she worked her tail off with the rest of them. It wan't too long before the crew was finished, and the formerly vacuous woodshed crammed with fuel for our winter fire.

The Crew minus Dave and Ralph

What a gift! Having the wood to get through the winter voluntarily donated along with all the labor (except for loading the stove and lighting the match) was wonderful, and greatly appreciated. However, perhaps even more appreciated is the knowledge that there are friends out there ready to help me and my family when we need it. Pretty awesome!

That's All!