Tools

Every morning the trails crew heads to the tool barn with a checklist of tools for the day. One by one they bring out these lethal weapons that are necessary for the day and I salivate of the possibility of being given one of these tools to use. One the first day we brought out a long cross cut (which you need to be certified to use), a 10ft long rock bar, hand saws, a couple pulaskis and pick axes, and some yellow bags to move dirt. We were given our assignments: John and Zach were to move the fallen tree with the hand saw and cross cut, Ryan and Heather were to use the pulaskis to chop something up. The supervisor then looked and Sarah and me and gave us the yellow bags to go collect rocks. OUT OF ALL THE AWESOME TOOLS I GOT THE STUPID YELLOW BAGS!! I felt like the woman in a hunter-gatherer community. While the men wielded the tools, hacked away at organic material and hauled trees out of the way, Sarah and I used our trick or treating bags to collect cobbles.

The next morning we packed up the rig with brush supplies. Once again the cross cut made the trip, as well as handsaws, shears, an axe, and massive clippers. This time I was guaranteed a fun tool. There were no duds among them. Nope. Not the case. Someone slipped in a pair of pruning shears- the type you would use to prune some tomato plants, or a rose bush. Once again, I was given the lamest tool. My job this time was to follow those with the shear, axes and saws while they hacked away at trees, and prune all the small stuff they missed.