Chicks with Chainsaws

Is there a truer image of what makes this country great than seeing women with chainsaws clearing brush. The perfect image of independence, ownership and accountability, plus the willingness to work hard. My morning was exactly this image. I had some brush in my back yard that needed to be cleared and 2 of my spinster friends came to lend their aid. One brought a chainsaw and the other brought a trailer. My parents are visiting so my 66 year old mother helped out by pruning trees and weeding the garden while my father went fishing with his brother. To be fair to my Dad, he didn't know the women were coming over to help with the yard when he made his plans, but not having a man around didn't stop us either.

Since we had the trailer we even stopped and got more gravel for my driveway and one friend and I spread one half ton of gravel in my driveway while the other continued cutting down trees in my backyard. The gravel was a side thought since we had the trailer, but I was surprised to find that there was a load and go landscaping supply store very near my house. My friend and I pulled the jeep in and got loaded up with a half ton of gravel. I went inside to pay and was flirting a bit with the man behind the counter. Just having a good time. Then when I walked out I realized something humiliating. Since I was planning on sweaty yard work, I hadn't taken a shower this morning. I also still had the residual of last night's make-up on my face, and with as much sweating as I'd been doing that make-up was in all the wrong places. But oh well. I was still having fun. We unloaded that first half ton (the trailer could not hold more weight than that) spread out the gravel and took a break for lunch. When we went back to get the rest of it, the guy at the landscape place remembered us and just hopped into his CAT tractor with the big scoop and loaded us up another half ton. We were pretty impressed with him remembering us so clearly, great customer service, but then how many people paint their trailer to match their Jeep?

My friend has a Jeep, of course she does, a very nice white one. The trailer that she has was modified by my spinster friends (a spinster ain't what she used to be) to have a smooth bottom and sides added. They then painted it so now the trailer has a black metal frame with white panel inserts. Exactly like the Jeep. But of course who wouldn't want their trailer to match their vehicle. You can't have them clashing. Color coordination is very important. As you're driving down the road hauling brush you don't want people to look at you and think "now isn't that color combination tacky!" We got back with the other load of gravel and the chick with the chainsaw had finished up and was piling the brush up to load into the trailer to haul off. We had almost all of the gravel out of the trailer, and the brush piled and ready to load, when the men came back. They had the audacity to grin at us as they pulled up from their fishing trip to see women with shovels and rakes spreading a ton of gravel. My father did help with the last of the spreading and loading, my uncle waved and drove away.

Independence and ingenuity are what this country is all about and my spinster friends display this in spades. This is not the first time they've assisted me with a brush clearing. Last year they did the same and the chick with the chainsaw actually had to shimmy up a tree to tie a rope around the top so the other lady and I could pull it as it was cut with the chainsaw. This was due to the power lines running very, very close to the tree. We had to make sure it didn't fall on those lines, but the ingenuity was displayed and we got the tree down with the power lines intact. We did what needed to be done.

These women will not sit around and whine about what needs to be done and that there's nobody to do it. They just do it. They might covent large construction equipment (one was commenting today on how handy it would be to have a back-hoe), but they do what needs to be done. We work together and help each other out so big jobs are smaller. This is what America is all about. Chipping in to help your neighbor and your neighbor chipping in to help you. Unfortunately we've gotten away from taking care of each other and started expecting the government to do it. An exercise in futility. But as long as there are people like my chainsaw chicks out there, this country will always be great.