Dead In Wisconsin

The sun came up from the other side of the lake and seeped through cracks in the plastic blinds. It was July, but I left the window open since it hardly got over seventy-five degrees. The air smelled liked last night’s bonfires, and I heard a fisherman start their motor from the dock.

Last week an older man stopped by the lake on his way to Duluth and drowned. Sheriff boats were everywhere and the boys at the camp couldn’t water ski all day. A couple guys at the town bar said they saw him swimming around the floating dock just fine until he wasn’t.

Even worse was yesterday. Since I got here last month, I’ve been seeing a fox prowling the outskirts of camp while I worked. She had the softest fur I’d ever seen. It was orange, just the slightest bit burnt, and shimmered as she weaved through the trees. My boss told me she’d recently given birth. Last afternoon I was picking up tree limbs and trash on the side of the road, and I saw her lying there on the asphalt with her insides falling out and I wanted to die.

I thought I dreamt her last night but wasn’t sure. This morning was colder than usual, forty-four at sunrise, and I stretched my feet out past the bottom of my bunk. My dog, Penny, whined at me. It was gentle, but assertive. Her intentions made clear. I oblige, and even give her some extra kibble on top of her full scoop just because.  

I put on my Green Hills Grill hoodie and a pair of cargo pants. Penny finished her meal and walked over to me with her head angled down, and I clip the leash onto her collar. The grass felt nice and even on bare feet, thanks to me striping it with a z-mower yesterday.

We walked around the building, which held four cabins and a bathroom. I unleashed her and we played with a stick until I made a kissing sound with my lips, and she followed me inside. I got ready in the shared bathroom before anyone else was up, then laced up my hiking boots.

The shop was just over a hill behind my cabin and smelled like sawdust and coffee. The three other caretakers and I talked shit for a couple of minutes before picking slips of paper off a workbench and set about the requests and repairs camp staff have sent in.

Plumbing and screen door issues were common, as were wasp nests and mouse trap queries. I was always looking for the unusual ask, the interesting problem that would make time go by especially fast. The choice was obvious: BAD widowmaker hanging above the 3rd grader picnic bench area. I took the paper and re-read it.

“Yeah, one of the counselors brought that in,” Andy said, sipping his mug. “Kid said there’s a huge, dead tree caught in the canopy waiting to fall. It’s hanging right above where the 9-year-olds are having their cookout tonight.”

      “Cool. I’ll get the pole saw.”

      “You’ll need a ladder, too,” Andy said.

      “Oh shit, alright.”

      “I can come with you,” he said.

      “I’ll call you if I can’t get it.”

      “Bring a helmet.”

I nodded and walked to the corner of the shop, next to the belt sander, and picked up the saw. It was awkward to balance, and I needed to use both hands to carefully lower it from its perch. I brought it over to the charging dock and popped a battery in the motor. I’d prefer it gas-powered.

I put it in the bed of an old Silverado, with the sheathed blade resting on the tailgate. I slid a six-foot ladder in right next to the pole saw to hold it in place. I hopped in the driver’s seat and cranked the window down before the mildewy cotton smell could overtake me.

The drive through camp was tranquil while the hundreds of boys were eating breakfast in the rec hall. NPR Duluth was mentioning, for the 30th time, that Brandi Carlile was playing the Minnesota State Fair this weekend. When any half-notable act comes near here, it’s a month’s worth of news.

Ancestral pine, birch, and aspen trees loomed above as I bounced the truck up a rocky path that leads to the soccer field and parked behind one of the goals. The cookout area was no more than a few a wooden picnic tables in the woods and a fire pit dug out of the earth.

Hanging over it was what looked like half an aspen tree that was caught by vines and limbs in the canopy. The lower half must have broken off Titanic-style. The trunk had a devilish fork in it at the top, and one of its prongs was far more tangled in the canopy than the other. In theory, one clean cut between them should be enough for gravity to do the rest.

I walked a circle around the suspended carcass and found a patch of flat ground before deploying the ladder angled away from where the trunk would fall. I set the motor on the ground and held the saw up vertically, using it as a cane as I climbed the first rung. The ladder’s feet sank an inch or so into the earth, and I was glad for the added stability. It sank a bit more when I climbed the second rung and was steady by the third.

I hoisted up the pole saw and held the rubber grip with both hands choked down towards the motor. Once it was balanced, I reached for the fork. My arms were fully extended and trembling, and the blade was barely touching it. I let the pole slide through my hands until the motor was back on the ground, and I pushed myself up two more rungs.

Now I could rest the blade between the tree’s prongs with my arms reasonably comfortable. I lifted the blade a couple inches and pressed the trigger. The chain spun fast enough, with a high-pitched whirl from the motor behind me. I held it down and slowly lowered the saw. The teeth dug into the wood and coughed sawdust down at me. My sunglasses blocked most of it, but not all of it like the helmet/visor combo I left back at the shop would have done.

I was working my way through, but slowly. There wasn’t enough power, and every minute or so the chain would get stuck, and I’d need to rock the blade up and down like a seesaw until it was free again.

The groove I was cutting was several inches deep now, and I took a moment to look around the woods. There was no sign of a single person, squirrel, fox, or bird anywhere in sight. The ladder wobbled in the soft ground as I craned my head, and I grabbed the top cap with my free hand. It hasn’t gotten warmer, but there was sweat under my hoodie.

My arms were getting sore, and I wiped my forehead with the back of my hand. What the hell am I even doing here? Paid summer vacation, my ass. The food is fucking awful. They promised that there’d be good vegan options and instead it’s scorched, shitty veggie burgers every day. The lake is freezing compared to the Gulf. Still, anything’s better than being stuck at home, I guess.

The motor whirl-ed as I started cutting again. Fresh sawdust found its way to my eyes and nose and the wood cracked suddenly, the groove splitting open an inch or so more on its own. I flinched, and grabbed the ladder, but the movement stopped. I took another look at the tree trunk. It was easily hundreds of pounds, dangling in the canopy by what might as well be a piece of twine at this point.

I need to cut this loose before it goes down much less predictably on its own. The whining from the chainsaw already sounded weaker. God damn batteries. There was only a beer can of thickness to get through, and I hear wood cracking. The chain is spinning half as fast as it was at the beginning, but finally it sliced clean through.

I yanked the saw out of the way and nearly toppled the ladder. Just as I had eyeballed it, the trunk plummeted instantly and crashed loudly in the dirt ten feet away. However, tangled and hidden in the canopy above, were several fifty to one hundred-pound limbs that were dislodged by the liberated tree trunk and followed it down.

I froze when the first one fell, passing inches from my face, and the other four death javelins surrounded me within a second like Final Destination. Each of these limbs were about as thick as a pool noodle and fell from a height of at least thirty feet. A total of five of them speared the ground in a half circle around the ladder, less than a foot away, without even grazing me.

As if I had been hit and was paralyzed, I stood on that ladder still holding the pole saw for what felt like hours. I wish I could say that I had a profound moment, some piece of clarity from the universe that only a near-death experience should give, but I felt nothing. I was totally numb, and a maybe a little hungry.

I climbed down the ladder and folded it up, putting the sheath back on the chainsaw after. I pulled the spears out of the ground, some of them half a foot deep, tossed them in a pile. Maybe the boys will chop them up and throw them in their bonfire tonight.

I carried my gear back to the Silverado and gently placed them in the bed. I climbed in the cab and turned the radio off and sat there in silence for couple minutes before putting the truck in gear. The campers were out of breakfast now and walking to various camp activities: archery, crafts, fire-building, etc.

Not wanting to drive cautious and slow through the foot traffic, I took a right at the bottom of the hill and drove down a gravel road until I passed through a wooden gate out of camp and onto the state road that led to town.

The sun was much more yellow than it was orange now and felt good on my face as I drove eastbound. I turned the radio back on and heard from Duluth NPR that they’re running a ticket giveaway to see Brandi Carlile at the Minnesota State Fair. I smirked and shook my head, holding my hand out the window and feeling the air between my fingers.

It wasn’t until I passed the fox, mangled on the side of the road with filth-covered fur and her tongue hanging out, that I started to cry.