the Zen of stacking firewood

 "One way to think of zen is this: a total state of focus that incorporates a total togetherness of body and mind. Zen is a way of being. It also is a state of mind. Zen involves dropping illusion and seeing things without distortion created by your own thoughts."

"Sun is warm, grass is green."

from the Urban Dictionary

I won't say that I'd like to spend months stacking firewood, but there is something very satisfying about doing the amount I do have to do. First of all there is the fact that while doing it I really don't have to think of anything beyond the wood and the job at hand. There is nothing but the moment, the physical labor, the feel of a chunk of wood in my hand, three or four cradled in my arms, the satisfaction of seeing a well-balanced stack grow. The only thinking required is which pieces of wood will make a good crib at the end of the row. The only thing beyond 'the moment' is imagining the winter fires from it. The wood that will be just outside the door  if our power goes out.
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Basically there is some good exercise attached to moving the wood from a loose pile to a strong, easy to access stack. Bend and pick up a chunk. Get another. Usually for me four is the maximum at one time and then walk to the stack and decide where these go. There is no room for wondering whether Obama will ever get his mojo back. The only mojo required is mine.

Some years, I have stacked a cord of firewood in a few hours or less. I was younger then. I suppose I could still do it if I really needed to. I don't need to. So I stack some and then go in the house to check online or write something, maybe have lunch, drink a cold drink. When my body feels ready, when I have caught my breath (yes, it is aerobic exercise), I go back out and repeat the whole process.

This year I stacked some of it in the rain which added another pleasing element as it wasn't a cold rain. It didn't even require a coat. It was a nice steady rain where I could hear it falling, hear the creek below the house and then the clunk of the wood as it hit the pile.

Sorting between the firewood we bought, which is wonderfully split, so dry and easy to work with, fairly uniform in size, and the wood that Farm Boss dragged from the back, yields another aspect to the task, a bit like life. Sort the good and easy to add to the pile wood from the difficult and how the heck will that one ever fit in any stack wood.

I suppose it could even yield a philosophical metaphor to the stacking if one wanted to go there, but I'd rather just leave it at one of my favorite jobs around the farm. One I hope to be doing for many years if my body holds up.