3 Cords

The engine coughs to life on a quick pull of the cord. There is wood to split. We start with the logs we hadn’t touched since we stacked them last year. The wedge of the splitter forges its way into the material, burying most of the blade before the wood gives way. Insects scamper as their home is sundered. It goes like this until the old stack is processed and it is time to work our way through the new. Log after log goes under the maul. The jumble on the lawn shrinks and the neat rows grow. We stop more often as fatigue creeps in. Conversation is impossible over the sound of the engine and given the weariness in our eyes, there wouldn’t be much to say anyway. This is what life is like at an outfitter in November.