(Despite what today’s header image may look like at first, no, it isn’t a plain black stripe. Zoom in. Read on.)
Social media were inundated Wednesday by cell-phone snaps of Tuesday night’s aurora borealis, which dipped south into regions rarely treated to such a show. You didn’t see any photos of it in my gallery yesterday, though.
That’s because I slept through it. I guess I needed the rest.
The promise of a repeat performance Wednesday night didn’t materialize — when the Sun’s coronal mass ejection (CME) landed on Earth’s doorstep, scientists say, its magnetic field was pointed in the wrong direction to produce the kind of spectacle seen the night before.
So yeah, I missed this one. I took an image of the northern sky anyway, in the wee hours of Thursday morning.
Clear sky. The moon was still behind the summit. I turned 90 degrees to the left — click.
And then I faced south — click.
This latest appearance of the Northern Lights in The South may have slipped by me, but the starry wonders of these heavens were still on full display.
Wednesday brought The Mountain one of the biggest temperature swings I can recall seeing here. After a morning low of 35°F, the mercury climbed to an afternoon high of 74°F. Thursday seemed to be on-track for the same, beginning at 37°F.
Trippin’ to Flippin early Wednesday meant that I arrived in the wood yard later than I would’ve liked. I was sweating and shedding layers in no time. And while I don’t have a problem with that, I do prefer working when it’s cooler.
I vowed to get an earlier start yesterday.
But start what, exactly? I wasn’t sure. All I knew was that I wanted to work.
I had enough combustible trash to justify a small burn. I began with that.
Because I’d brought the Ranger, that meant I had my ax and my hookaroon with me. I looked around for something accessible to split — it had been a while since I’d swung the ax, and I want to keep my skills sharp.
I picked about a dozen oak and ash lengths off the stacks, each four to six inches in diameter. None absolutely had to be split for the woodstove, but taking aim at smaller targets helps hone my accuracy.
I even grabbed a chunk of the princess tree trunk I’d bucked, curious to see just how easily it yields to the ax.
Answer: very easily. Not a surprise.
Between my chopping block and the road is all that red oak I’ve set aside for processing with a gas-powered hydraulic splitter. I looked over at it, wondering if there was anything worth tackling by hand.
Not really. But before I put my tools away yesterday morning, I wanted at least a mild challenge. I chose a round and set it on the block.
Eight or nine inches across — certainly not impossible with an ax — it sported a couple of good-sized knots. I drew a bead on a promising radial crack and took a purposeful cut at it.
Bullseye. The round didn’t fly apart, but that wasn’t a problem. (Semi-pro tip: Expecting every swing to completely split stringy, half-seasoned oak is delusional.) What the impact did produce was a satisfying crack running almost its entire length.
Another strike at the same spot cleaved it cleanly in half. I took two more cuts, resulting in four stove lengths.
That’s what I’m talkin’ about.
It felt so good that I went back over to the pile and looked for another naughty– er, knotty candidate. I found one. Four swings. Same result.
Discipline makes me better. Working makes me stronger. Wood heats my home.
I’m glad I no longer have to explain any of that.
Maintaining a comfortable pace while processing that wood was essential to the work going smoothly. I’d stop every now and then and sip hot coffee from an insulated tumbler. Between swings, I’d pause intentionally and absorb the beauty all around me.
I don’t think it gets better than this. Life is good.
A little home-heating housekeeping was in order, and it’s been on my mind for some time. Setting aside uncertainty (because it doesn’t serve me here and now), Thursday afternoon I drove the Ranger down to the crest and walked into the woods to examine a fallen oak I discovered over a year ago.
It was a great day to be out on the land, regardless of the reason.
I wanted to see if the grounded tree was viable and worth the effort, with an eye on the 2026-2027 season. It wasn’t hard to find — I went right to it and pecked at the trunk in several places with my carpenter’s hatchet.
Other than some dry pith at the base, where it broke off during a windstorm, it’s solid under the bark. The main trunk is 18 or 20 feet long and a foot in diameter. The crown includes two large limbs, totaling another 15 feet of firewood-to-be.
(Plus branch wood, of course, if I choose to harvest it.)
I also discovered two smaller leaning-dead trees nearby. Both of those passed my hatchet test, too, so I’ll bring them in at the same time.
My original plan was to clear a trail (off the cut toward the summit) and pull this wood out that way. (You may remember that I talked about that here in January.) I’ve reconsidered — I think it makes more sense to skid log lengths straight out to the road.
The distance is a hundred feet, give or take, which is less than half as long as the trail would be (never mind not having to clear brush, drop trees and build a trail). I’ll buck logs roadside and haul the rounds up to the wood yard for splitting and stacking.
So yesterday I plotted a straight-line, least-resistance path from the downed tree to the road. I eyeballed a couple of solid places to park the Ranger while winching.
And I built a directional cairn to mark the access spot at the edge of the woods.
(Yeah, I know it’s not an elegant, classic cairn. Fight me.)
It was good to be back out on the eastern slope of The Mountain — long views are opening up there now, too. And any time in the woods is time well spent.
Take care of yourselves, Patriots. Stay calm. Stay sharp. Stay free.
#WiseUp #LibertyOrDeath #Ungovernable
One thought on “I slept through the Northern Lights”
Comments are closed.