Woodpile

After weeks of cutting down trees, sawing them into exact 16-inch fireplace length, and wheelbarrowing them to a pile near the garage, enough wood had accumulated that we decided it was time to get rid of it. We have no immediate use for firewood so onto craigslist it went. We placed an ad on a Thursday night offering ‘Free unseasoned firewood’ and my cell phone rang all morning Friday, and several other people emailed looking for directions.

There wasn’t enough firewood for all of Charlotte, but the second man who called, Mike, came with his son the next day and took about three car loads of wood (he had a Volvo wagon). And since he cut up a large fallen tree for us, I agreed to deliver it to his house if he loaded it onto my truck.

So load the truck he did. I was practically riding a wheelie the entire five miles to Mike’s house, and then once there I had to drive diagonally down his ravine-like back yard to unload the truck exactly at his outdoor fire pit.

Once we had the truck unloaded, the bed-liner was covered with chunks of bark, saw dust, twigs, which I made a subtle reference to, but without even a twinge from Mike. I thought that since I had gone out of my way to deliver the wood, which I estimated had a market value of over $100—especially delivered this way—that the guy would have been courteous enough to offer me a free truck bed sweep. But he made me ask for it. He reluctantly went to his house and returned with a grass broom and swept the bed clean, or nearly so. Somehow he overlooked the tailgate, but I let it go. I thanked him, said no more deliveries, he thanked me in return and I got in my truck.

Since an unloaded pick-up does not do well in reverse up a muddy hillside, we agreed I should turn around and go up nose first. But this was not so easily done. After at least a thirty seven-point turn between clusters of trees and a swing set, I managed to get pointed in the right direction. Mike held up a limb that was blocking the way and I proceeded gently and steadily up the short hill trying my best not to spin the tires. Nevertheless, the rear wheels slipped—just a bit—and I caught myself snickering at the thought of the ruts I was leaving behind.

But what goes around comes around.

Since Mike had taken only a small fraction of the wood we had available we posted another firewood ad two weeks later. Again, instant interest. I arranged for the first two callers to come by, and they did, at exactly the same time Saturday morning. I was sure there’d be a fistfight in the driveway as two pick-ups and a customized van rolled up to the garage and drivers with their various helpers began spilling out into the yard and surrounded the woodpile. But ultimately everyone played nice and loaded their respective vehicles responsibly.

What did go awry is that the van driver, who had a funny oversized upper lip, and a belly to match, tried backing his tank around his buddy’s truck and got his wheels stuck in the mud in the culvert along the drive. All he had to do was wait for his pal to pull out and he could have stayed high and dry, but no, he had to plow his own path—through my yard no less—just to get out first. It was pointless. He had no reasonable objective and the only explanation is that the guy was one sandwich short of a picnic. He had a total disregard for our property, and lacked any kind of sense about driving into a low area after a recent heavy rain.

When he had spun the tires sufficiently to bury the van up to its frame he got out and lit a cigarette while his buddy connected a tow strap to the van’s trailer hitch and prepared to pull him out. And this is where it got interesting.

His pal starts pulling with his truck and the van guy puts one leg in the van and starts working the accelerator with his foot while the other foot is outside on the soggy earth. Bad idea. Meanwhile, the van isn’t going anywhere because the wheel was turned the wrong way. So I point this out to him and he straightens the wheel and the van instantly lurches backward and the guys eyes pop out of his head because he suddenly realizes that his van is moving and only 20 percent of him is in it. So he does this panicked one-legged back-stepping skip-hop, a newly lit cigarette bouncing between his lips, as he simultaneously tries to get into the van and steer it safely. But the van keeps moving higher toward the driveway and the guy is going deeper into the culvert losing his balance with each step.

I’d love to say he fell on his rump, but he somehow managed to stay upright. The van stopped, the guy takes a drag from his cigarette, and hops right in. No reaction at all.

Just another day in Loonyville for this character.

What irked me was that he left a 10-inch trench in my grass with hardly a word about it. I think he said, as he was driving away with $100 of my hard-earned wood, “Oh, sorry about the mess.”

Right. You offer people something of value for free, and they squish your generosity into the mud as they leave. What’s worse is that those guys will probably sell that wood for a hundred bucks, too.

But no real harm was done, I got rid of a lot of excess green wood, and got a good chuckle from watching that guy shuffle in the culvert.