As I mentioned before, I am not overly fond of my chainsaw. I consider it a necessary evil that will eventually do me harm. OK, more harm! Chainsaws are accidents running to make it happen.

As I also mentioned, Sal and I have been ‘into’ gathering logs these days. Got another two yesterday. Firs. “Hard firs are good to find” (Mae West during her logging camp era). And it is there that today’s story begins…

Sal and I are on a remote beach up the coast doing the log-salvaging thing. We are ‘peaveying’ logs and wrangling them to the waters edge where we will hook them up to the boat for eventually towing home. Larger logs are easier to wrangle if cut by chainsaw into thirds or so. And that was what I was doing when a small aluminum boat with two of our neighbours comes in to see what ‘Dave and Sal are up to’.

We chat. Crack a few jokes. And then I say, “Well, gotta get some of this cut up………” and head off to do some cutting, firing up the ol’ killing machine at the same time as I skip golightly over the slippery and rocky terrain of a wild, rocky coastline.

‘T’ is a first aid attendant to the really, truly remote logging, mining and other Northern work site locations. She just came back that day from a few weeks in the Yukon. “Gonna get your safety chaps on, eh?”

I was in shorts and a t-shirt.

“Unh, no. Not gonna. Don’t have any. Don’t want any. Safety equipment is too dangerous. Every time I wear some, I get hurt. Too encumbering.” She and ‘D’, her husband, who knows more about trees and wood cutting than MacMillan Bloedel, nod sagely as if to say, “Well, we know how that guy is going to die!”

I cut into the wood. My chainsaw works harder than it should. The chips are not flying. I get through the log but it is a painful exhibition especially considering the audience. “Sounds like that saw could use a bit o’sharpening, eh?”, says ‘D’.

“No!” I say a bit too emphatically. “I sharpened it. But I may have left the rakers too high since I don’t really know how high they should be.”

“Well, bring it on over to the boat. Let me have a look. Soon sort that out!”

“No!” I say with panic and desperation in my voice, “I’ll do it.”

Then I realize how stupid that sounds so I explain myself, “I can’t bring my chainsaw over to you, man. Too embarrassing. A man’s gotta do his own chainsaw, ya know? Can’t go exposing oneself like that. Too humiliating. Like flipping your penis on a table for comparison purposes, ya know?”

‘T’ laughs and says with a grin. “Well, come on over and flip your penis out for comparison purposes then!”

That is not an option at the best of times (of which there are precious few in life and most of them are in Asia). ‘D’ is 6 feet 8 inches tall if he is a foot. This is not the best of times. There will be no flippin’ dicks around here, I tell her. “And I am not showing my chainsaw either. Same thing!”

She laughs again but ‘D’ knows. He says, “C’mon, T. A man has to do his own chainsaw. I was wrong to offer. We better leave him in peace.”

Mercifully, they leave me to butcher myself with a dull chainsaw in ‘piece’. In the circumstances, it was the decent thing to do.