Killer trees of Oregon

And some nicely timed news about a gallery show I'm in next month on the coast

Fallen trees like these have been blocking the lower trail since January. The big tree lying on the ground behind me was the last one we cut on Sunday.

Sunday being a nice day, Noah and I headed down to the woods below our house to start clearing the trail that runs along the western edge of our property. It’s the last chapter in our campaign to restore order to the woods after the January ice storm; we’ve already cleared the rest of our forest trails of downed trees, cut back the brush, and groomed the paths until they’re walkable again.

The lower trail came last because it’s the most challenging. A couple dozen Doug-firs fell on or above the trail in two wild tangles, difficult and dangerous to cut. Tree huggers notwithstanding, trees around here can be killers. Our plan is to clear as much as we can ourselves and then call in a professional to cut a path safely.

Noah and I carried saws, a weed eater and other tools through the old pasture down to the far end of our woods and worked our way back on the trail through the dense forest, cutting about a dozen medium-sized trees blocking the path without much drama. The problem is the trees get bent and twisted when they fall, so they’re often lying on the ground like giant coiled springs, ready to snap at the unwary. I’ve been cutting trees like this ever since we moved here, and, motivated by a couple close calls, have learned to read them pretty well. Noah’s been a quick study, so we compare notes on each tree before starting the saw.

Anyway, the last tree we were looking to cut Sunday was a large Doug-fir that had wedged itself against three other trees into a 100-foot arc. The spot where it fell across the trail was near the root ball, which anchored that end pretty well. It was clear we had to cut from the uphill side, standing inside of the arc, but at 30 inches the tree was thicker than our biggest chainsaw bar is long. I started by cutting about a quarter of the way through the downhill face, to give the cut a start. Then I got back on the safe, uphill side and cut across the tree to the saw cut I'd already made. 

Good theory, but there was one narrow strap of wood and bark on the downhill side holding it all together that I missed, and I couldn't reach it from uphill. So after some thought and discussion I climbed back over with the saw and stood in the safe shadow, so to speak, of the root ball end of the tree and reached across to cut the strap.

All I remember next is an explosion of excruciating pain in my left knee. I found myself lying on the ground five feet downhill from the tree, which itself had moved about eight feet downhill from its original position. I was too dizzy and nauseated at first to get up. I couldn’t tell where the saw was, but it wasn’t running anymore. And Noah was standing there saying, “Are you all right?” I finally got the nerve to look myself over and discovered that yes, in fact, I was all right, except for the pain in my knee. No blood, no broken bones, and I was able to sit up and, after a few minutes, carefully stand.

I don't remember any of what happened except the burst of pain and the weirdness of coming to, flat on my back on the ground. Noah, who saw the whole thing, says I got too close to the dangerous part of the log when I cut it. It caught me across my stomach when the bent log straightened, and I was draped over it like a rag doll as it pushed me down the hill. In the middle of my wild ride, he says, I was holding the chain saw, still running, with my right hand, and reached across with my left to shut it off before I dropped it. He was fairly certain he was watching me get seriously maimed or killed. 

Once my head cleared, I was able to walk back to the house — about a quarter mile, some of it on a rough deer trail — with the help of a branch that served as a walking stick. I spent the rest of the day icing my swollen knee, devouring Tylenol and planning how I could reach the refrigerator for snacks and more ice in the least number of steps. When I saw the doctor the next day, she poked and prodded and asked questions and got an x-ray and declared there was probably nothing but a painful soft tissue injury. It would go away. The x-ray confirmed: nothing broken or dislocated. Meanwhile, she gave me a knee brace that does wonders for my ability to walk, especially up and down stairs, though I still have to be careful of twists and turns.

It’s not yet entirely clear to either of us what happened. It was the end of four hours of nonstop cutting, and I was getting tired, which may have led to my carelessness about where I was standing. There are no bruises, bumps, scrapes, or cuts anywhere on my body besides the kind you normally get when cutting wood or even just bushwhacking through the forest. I figure my left foot caught on something that twisted my knee as the log pushed me down the hill. I can’t believe the log didn’t just knock me down and then run over me, leaving a pile of broken bones in its wake.

I am weirdly amused, though, that in the middle of all this chaos I carefully shut off the saw. Nice to know I did something right.

Here's a photo Noah took after the dust cleared. The trail runs up the middle of the picture. The log coming in from the bottom left is the one that hit me; the one coming in from the right is what I cut it off from. The one on top is a separate tree that’s high enough off the trail not to bother with. My favorite kind.

And in other, much better news…

Monday afternoon, after I’d seen the doc, I was at home feeling grumpy about the prospect of spending the next few weeks limping around on my newly torqued knee when I got an email from the Mindpower Gallery, over on the southern Oregon coast in Reedsport.

“Congratulations!” it began. “We are pleased to announce that your following submissions have been accepted into our 35th Anniversary ‘A Celebration of Art’ Showcase….”

Nothing like an unexpected acceptance arriving out of the blue to cure grumpiness. They’re wanting to show two of my hand colored photos, one of a wild horse on Steens Mountain and the other a landscape of the rainforest on a foggy day at Heceta Head, also on the Oregon coast. The show opens with a reception on September 27 and runs through October 31.

I’ll be there at the opening, if a killer tree hasn’t gotten me yet.