Heavy, frozen snow now blankets the woodlot.  Thought that I would get one more trip into the woods to pick up the rest of the winter’s kindling, but the results of Wednesday’s 12 incher blocked my ATV right at the now impenetrable wall of snow pushed up by the plow guys.  It’ll be that way now until spring unless it warms up, which given that it’s December, and this is Vermont, is highly unlikely.  Just maybe, I might be able to convince my wife that a winter walk in the woods snapping off the dead lower branches would be “refreshing”.  My guess is that the LP will see right through that suggestion.   Otherwise it’s a trip to the hardware store to buy the more than expensive Georgia fatback pine kindling which works instantly, but sometimes I think that I might as well  start the fire with dollar bills.   It’s all part of the “joy” of heating by wood in the dead of a Vermont winter.   Getting past my whining, all of this is good for my head and good for the exercise even though it does mean a bit of consistent thinking about the woodstove, keeping tabs on the woodpile on not letting up on banking the fire during the night.

I was deep in my Vermont woodlot this past weekend picking up sticks. Low 30’s, crisp and eerily quiet. Not the smartest thing that I ever did considering Saturday was the start of deer hunting season, but details are details, and time is quickly running out.  All it takes now is one deep snowstorm, and the kindling will continue to stay where it has rested all summer.  Most of the wood tent has been filled by Tom the Wood Guy, but I still need to haul in a couple of cords I stacked in the woods last spring, and the weather looks like it will hold until Thanksgiving.  Hopefully finish this coming weekend. 

“Every morning in Africa a gazelle wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the fastest lion or it will be killed. Every morning a lion wakes up. It knows it must outrun the slowest gazelle or it will starve to death. It doesn't matter whether you are a lion or a gazelle - when the sun comes up, you'd better be running.”

Monday was our second day without power, heat, running water and that most vital of all utilities, access to salesforce.com to check on my sales activities...  Huddled around the fireplace with the consistent hiss of Coleman lanterns casting a yellow glow over the room, we toughed it out with only limited whining…mostly on my part.  Every couple of years, since we live in Vermont and New Hampshire, we revisit what it’s like to endure these multi-day experiences without power, instant communication, and the basics of heat and plumbing.  And the bottom line is that it’s a bit inconvenient for sure, but nothing like what my great-grandfather, Horace, growing up in Poultney, Vermont, must have experienced his entire life.