It’s a dangerous business. Accidents happen. That’s why it pays well. That’s how I nearly have my house paid off. That’s how I could afford to raise six children. It’s a dangerous business, and because of that I may never see my wife or kids again. The only warning I had was a chorus of panicked shouts and the crackling snap of a tree succumbing to its own weight. There was a blurred movement in my peripheral vision, and then the weight of a car landed square on my shoulders. The branches might save your life by cushioning the blow, or they might be the very thing that kills you, impaling you like a splintered spike. It’s all blind luck. In my case it might be either. I don’t know. I can’t decide how badly I am injured. My body remembers my knees buckling, and those same knees were driven at least a foot into the earth by the weight on my back.
Now I am lying face-down in the dirt. There is a dull weight on my legs. I can’t breathe, but I don’t think there is any weight on my chest. I think the weight of the tree is on my legs now. Maybe I had the wind knocked out of me, or maybe there is a branch where one of my lungs used to be. Funny how I can feel a branch against my cheek, but I can’t decide if one has passed through my body. There are shouts of alarm, and distant sounds of movement. Someone is running this way, but it’s taking a long time for him to get here.
I’ve been felling trees six days a week for twenty-eight years. I’ve seen men die. I’ve seen strong men lose the ability to walk - men who could bound up a mountainside for hundreds of yards without stopping reduced to a wheelchair by a single tree. Someone always makes the joke that at least we get more of the trees than they get of us. It’s not a funny joke.
They will be pulling my youngest out of school within an hour from now, telling her that her dad has been in an accident. She’s seen it happen to others. Several children in the school have a father employed by the logging industry, and they never know when one of them might be called out of class to make an emergency trip to the hospital. The company will send someone to take both her and my wife to the hospital to see me. If I have to die, I hope to at least make it long enough to see them there.
They are starting to pull the tree off me now. I smell sap. That’s a relief. That means the tree that fell on me probably wasn’t a "widow-maker" - a dried out dead tree that hasn’t fallen yet. They are tree skeletons, pale as bone. If one of those falls on you, you are in real trouble. The dead branches don’t bend - they only break. They weigh less but I’d rather be hit by a heavier living, healthy tree any day. A green branch will almost certainly bend rather than go through you.
They are putting me on a stretcher now. I can breath a little. There isn’t any damp - no blood. I’m going to live. I may never walk again, but I’m going to live. The biggest worry now is how badly my back was injured by the blow. Even in the best-case scenario, it’s doubtful I’ll be returning to work for a few weeks. I can feel the heat of the mid-day sun on my face as they carry me down the hillside. The stretcher rocks and bumps, and I can only think how much I love these woods. My eyes are closed, but it’s the smells and sounds that make this place alive.
-J.R. Willett
The above is my interpretation of a story I once heard about my maternal Grandfather, Vester Cooper. After some time off, he recovered, and returned to his job where he continued logging until he retired.