Man Day (last week): Dorland, one of our tree runners, competing in the Highland Games
The shale/jungle kife. If you could see your feet, it's because there was too much rock for anything to grow there. My thoughts: "You want me to plant trees where...?"
"Baby Daddy" and his baby
Zip
Jordan's a single father...but I do think she's pretty adorable!
Tuesday I was told to plant with Jordan, so I went into his big, crazy-shaped and densely over-grown piece to finish it up with him. My favourite part of pieces that are full of young poplars is that the leaves hold water really well, so if you walk into a piece in the morning after it's rained, within 5 minutes you look like you've been doused by a super-soaker. That's sarcasm. Go figure, Tuesday was the day I decided to take my rain pants out of my day pack because I'd only used them once so far. After getting soaked by the trees, the clouds opened up and we got soaked by the sky as well. All day I could hear my feet squooshing in my boots, and when I got back to my tent at the end of the day, I literally poured water out of them. I think between my boots and my socks, I had a full cup of water in there! When your feet are wet all day, they call it "trench rot", but I have decided to change the name to "swamp foot" because it sounds more ominous. Needless to say, I had swamp foot that day, and my feet were so sore I could barely stand up the next day.
Wednesday we left camp early at 6:30 because we had a really long bus ride to the block. We had also been told to expect to work late. Of course, on top of the long ride, we got lost and didn't end up starting until 10:00, and we were told that we weren't coming home until we planted 85 000 trees. That's almost an impossible number when we have gorgeous land. We thought the land we planted on Tuesday was kife...but we had no idea what was coming. For one, the ground was shale, so it was like planting a gravel driveway all day. For two, the area was so dense and overgrown that at some points I was standing one furrow (6 ft) away from Jordan and couldn't even see him through the trees. It was like planting a jungle! I could rarely see my feet through the leaves, and ended up tripping over logs and slamming my shovel into my own toes all day.
It's a good thing Jordan and I planted together that day, because I think he'd still be lost in the bush if I weren't with him. At one point we bagged out and I started walking back to the cache. I turned around to see Jordan heading in the opposite direction of the road, towards the forest at the back of our piece. I asked him where he was going, and he said, "To our cache", in a "Duh, where do you THINK I'm going?" voice. He makes me laugh.
Thursday was the same piece, the same land, and the same frustration. At one point I got so angry that I fought a tree with my shovel because it stole my hat. I won the battle, but in the process I tripped over a hidden log and fell over backwards. Jordan, the gentleman he is, saw how upset I was, and...no he didn't offer me a hand up. Instead he yelled, "DISHES!" Dishes is a game we play. It's pretty simple: if you see someone fall, you yell "dishes" and then they have to do your dishes that night. I'm terrible on my feet, even in good land, so I did a lot of extra dishes this week.
The day got better around 2:00 though. Jordan and I were going along side-by-side through our shale-filled furrows, playing the alphabet game, when I spotted some creamy brown soil in the middle of the red shale. I went to put my shovel in it, and all of the sudden it moved, scaring the crap out of me. It was a fawn that didn't see us until the last minute, and when it did it got up really fast and darted off through the furrows. Jordan's instinctual reaction to this was completely natural--within seconds he dropped his bags, threw his shovel, and took off running after the deer. I planted a few more trees, and then heard him tearing back through the bush so I turned around to see. And just then he caught it with his bare hands! I couldn't believe it--he was holding up this baby deer, whose legs were dangling incredibly awkwardly as it started bleating loudly for it's mother. At that moment, Jordan realized the mother could come out of the jungle at any point, so he did another completely natural thing--he decided not to put it down, but instead to head for the road to show people and get some photos. We know we're terrible people... We never did see any sign of the mother though, so we'll never know if it was abandoned or not. To make ourselves feel better, we'll say it was, and we saved it. So we showed Matt, who was planting across the road from us, and then our tree runners showed up to see too. After a lot of debate about what would be best for "Zip", we decided to take it back to camp on the bus so Matt's cousins could pick it up and raise it in their backyard, which still had a deer fence from when they used to raise deer. So Eric Wigboldus and Brandon took care of the deer until the bus ride home, during which it sat quietly with Jordan for an hour, and then me for the next hour. Back at the shop we fed it out of a cow bottle that one of Matt's cousins brought, and it guzzled the milk back like it hadn't eaten in days. It was so adorable! And now Zip is happily living at the Haveman's, being doted on by a bunch of kids who are happy to raise her.
And that was our week! That night we packed up our stuff, and had a sleepover in the shop, since we were leaving to catch our flight back to Hamilton early in the morning. We spent an awesome weekend at home, being with the Burgsma family at a wedding on Friday, friends in Hamilton on Saturday, family and friends in Aylmer on Sunday, and then celebrating Jordan's birthday and apartment shopping on Monday. It was a full, but relaxing weekend, and now it's been extended a bit as we wait for the next helicopter out to Black Bay. Word on the street is there's internet up there, so although I might not be able to call home on weekends (sorry Moms), I'll still be able to blog. I'll be sure to put photos up, because right now, Black Bay is as big a mystery to me as it is to you. I'm excited to get there tomorrow and get planting.
Plant trees!!!!
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