Decking the Lookout was a breeze so long as we paid heed to the eight feet between us and the floor below. And the hole we'd framed in the floor for the stairs that'd eventually rise. I was struck by the notion that eight feet down is much farther than eight feet up. Once again it was work in its purest form moving material upstairs without stairs. I'd lift and push from below, Emil'd pull from above. A three quarter inch sheet of plywood doesn't look heavy 'til you grab and move one. All finger work. Hard enough but the walls were worse.
A twelve by sixteen floor's not a lot of space to stack materials, tools and sawhorses much less build stud walls. We did our assembly below. When finished we stood and leaned the beasts against the rafters, ascended the ladder and hoisted away, one at a time. There's a reason they call it grunt work.
Emil had us frame out rough openings for six double mullion and two triple mullion casement windows in the fifty-six feet of Lookout walls, more window than wall. Guess he didn't want to miss anything bigger than a pine squirrel fart while surveying his kingdom. I could see him now, peering down the double barrels of tripod mounted battleship binoculars, scoping the brook for rising trout, "Archie me lad, there's one just below the second set of riffles feeding on mayflies." Then sliding down the brass fireman's pole directly into his waiting knee boots. Less than a minute from sighting to hookup to chuckling release.
Can't say I was dumbfounded but it did catch my notice how much a hundred-fifty pounds of nail and stud wall would bend when we drew it aloft. Oddly enough they didn't seem worse for wear. By mid-afternoon we had six, eight foot sections and two, four footers stacked above and ready to nail down.
"The easy part's nearly done. Once we get these walls up and braced we'll start in on the roof trusses. Building them's not the challenge. Getting them up here and nailing them down's when the fun starts. Challenge and fun, can't think of a better combination. Well, given a minute I might come up with a few dozen other things to top them but for the moment they'll have to do."
"Archie me lad, we'll have do the next couple of steps by the seat of our pants. Haven't fully thought them through. Back when I was drawing the plans I knew we'd have to get creative when the upper roof went on. Probably have to build some kind of scaffolding before we set to sheathing. Had we prehensile tails we'd be fine but our ancestors forgot to bring them along when they climbed out of the trees."
By supper the walls were up. A trip to the cooler told us we were nearly out of food. Emil scrounged up his ace in the hole meal, sausage and noodles. Doesn't sound like much but when you're as hungry as we were it's pure ambrosia (one of these days I'm gonna have to find out what that is. Sounds good but might turn out to be some kind of entrails stewed with beets. We weren't too particular as to what we ate but might've drawn the line at that combination).
His recipe was simple, simmer and brown some sausage, doesn't matter what kind so long as it hasn't started to ripen. Boil and drain a pound of egg noodles. Draining required care and spread legs since we lacked a colander. Mix the two together while splashing in some kind of pepper sauce, Emil was partial to Tabasco. Also work in a fair amount of black pepper and top it off with a blizzard of parmesan cheese. The hot sauce was there to remind us to chew, otherwise we'd shoveled it in like there was no tomorrow. Our first couple of bites would go down that way anyhow. However, once the fire was kindled below we knew enough to slow down, smell the roses, and douse the flames before we burned to ash. Good stuff.
Headed to town on Wednesday morning with empty coolers and three laundry bags of ripe filth we called clothing. Before returning we stopped at the mill where Emil picked up a couple of dozen studs and some planking.
"I hadn't figured on needing this much lumber. On the other hand I've never built a cabin before. Live and learn. And spend. Should have done a better job at foreseeing the unforeseen. Oh well, we'll have that much more lumber when it comes to building the outhouse. Should have enough to construct the Tajma-crapper. Might even be able to turn a few greenbacks with tourist trade. People'll come from all over the midwest just to see what we've created. On second thought I don't know if I can handle a dome. And definitely need a better name. Might have to try something along the line of the Prairie School. Give it a Wright touch. Maybe throw in some cantilevered decking and call it Falling Water West, the House Built on Word Play. Yeah, I could hang my hat on that one."
While at the mill we ran into Ted. He and Emil got talking about how much fun they'd had on the Brule. "By the way Emil, your windows are in. Should you want I'll throw in the lumber you've ordered and bring the whole shebang along first thing in the morning. Some of those casements are a bear to lift. Throw in a cup of coffee and a slab of your cinnamon bannock and I'll help you load them into the cabin. Sound good to you?"
"Ted, I'd be more than grateful. I figured me and Archie could handle it but it'd be touch and go at best. By the way, we need to stack them on the second floor. That okay with you?"
"Don't see a problem with that. Just make sure you're up and moving by eight-thirty. I know how it is, old men and children need their sleep."
By the time Ted drove in we'd already made breakfast, pulled all the braces we dared, baked a bannock, moved plywood into position and discussed the pros and cons of Walt Disney having drawn all his characters with only four fingers per hand. Emil was of the opinion Mickey Mouse was given an extra toe on each foot as compensation but since the rodent never went barefoot there was no way to know. He added that Disney's redistribution of digits was no doubt was a Commie plot to subvert the minds of American youth and should have been investigated during the McCarthy hearings.
"Something like that could could've inhibited the ability of an entire generation to toe the line, lend a hand, shoulder a load, put their best foot forward and, most of all, be unable to insert their thumb in a pie and pull out a plum."
'Bout time I joined the parade, "The way I see it Uncle Emil, it all goes back to the Garden of Eden. Seems God made Adam and Eve with only four fingers per hand. Guess the Deity didn't like odd numbers. In the early years after those apple eaters were kicked out of paradise there was a lack of choice when choosing mates. Next thing you know there's a fifth finger popping up here and there. Simple case of inbreeding. The extra finger made them better hunters, farmers and soon the less productive quad-fingered ones started to disappear. Walt Disney simply used a little logic and drew Mickey, Minney, Mortie, Ferdie, in fact every one of his cartoon characters, just as the All-Knowing originally intended."
That set Emil back for a moment. Finally gave me a stare, "Good Lord, what have I wrought? Archie me lad, the world's in serious trouble."
The rumble of the diesel greeted us five minutes before we saw it. For a change Ted backed up the driveway and pulled to a stop alongside the cabin. With a, "first we offload, then we eat" from Ted, we set to work. Stacked the downstairs windows in a corner and tarped them over. The upstairs load took a while. Off the truck, onto the deck, lifted onto the platform then pressed above where Emil waited. By nine-thirty we were sitting down.
"Those windows'll be in the way when you go to framing the roof but I 'spose you know that Emil."
"Yah, I've given it some thought. Also given some thought to Archie being eighteen, limber and fearless. There'll come times when when he'll be the skyhook I've always dreamed of. No, we''ll just take 'er as she comes. Build scaffolding and move it as necessary. Once the roof's up and shingled it's clear sailing."
"What I like best Emil is using Archie as a skyhook. One ankle hooked in a forked branch. Yeah, I know what you mean. Done a few things that bordered on stupid myself. Moving trusses while sitting on a wall frame, one leg wrapped around a stud, twenty feet off the ground and hanging into space. I can do it Archie, so can you. Just don't do anything really stupid. Gravity can be a danger when it comes to construction. Listen to your uncle. Looks like he's swung his share of hammers and still has all five of his fingers." Ted paused, "Well, I'm off. There's another load waiting on me down to the mill."
Emil topped off Ted's thermos and he was gone. Once the truck passed from earshot the silence of our clearing was intense. "When Ted mentioned your fingers Uncle Emil, it was almost like he'd heard what we'd been talking about before he drove in."
"Probably just a coincidence Archie. But who knows? The idea of him knowing's a lot more fun to think about. Let's get to work."
We began by building the four roof trusses of two by six lumber. Used scraps of plywood as gussets. The lookout was to have a hip roof sloping in all four directions with three foot eaves. The main floor's roof would mirror the lookout's pitch giving the cabin the look of a two story pagoda. Both sets of wide sweeping eaves would bring a hint of the prairie to the northwoods.
"What can I say? The roof's lack of pitch'll do it in eventually. But you know, I don't care. Growing old will do me in too. Such is life and that includes death. In the meantime I'll live in a cabin that makes me happy." Once the trusses were finished we moved on to the scaffolding.
There are times in life when you do what's necessary but it doesn't seem to move things forward. Scaffolding's one of them. Put it up, use it for a few hours, tear it down and assemble it in a new location. Repeat the process 'til the job's done then store the lumber under the cabin. By the second move we were getting good at it but each move took close to two hours.
Emil's scaffolding was a jury rigged affair. We gave it a few shakes before leaning a ladder on it. Seemed solid. Once aboard we tippy-toed for the first minute for fear of collapse. Turned out the six foot wide decking was stable as bedrock. Can't say I've ever been afraid of heights yet it took a while aloft to feel comfortable. We finished the morning by hauling the first truss above and hanging it upside-down, crosswise, from the Lookout walls.
Two hours into the afternoon the trusses were in place and braced. "Now comes the fun part, Archie. Always seems like there's a fun part coming along doesn't it? Never made a hip roof before. Looks simple enough when you've seen one framed correctly. Not so simple when you take a close look at the compound cuts necessary to make one work. Two angles to each cut. Spoke with a carpenter back in Parkers about it. He said to start with an extra long corner piece of lumber and be ready to screw up 'til you get it right. Once we get the angles figured out she'll go slick as snail snot."
Don't know how or why but it turned out I had the touch. Emil scratched his head for a moment then bowed to youth. He penciled out the angles, I did the sawing. Wasn't a job you could horse your way through but instead, required constant checking of the lines and saw kerf. By the time of a late dinner we were nearly framed. It was a day of careful concentration in which time passed unnoticed.
Around four-thirty I heard a yell followed by a whirring sound and a splash. Seemed to be coming from the other side of the roof. When I peeked around the corner there stood Emil with his thumb in his mouth. When I asked him if he was okay Emil simply said, "Archie me lad, would you lend a wounded old man a hand and help him find his hammer? Could be it's in the stream. Didn't think I had that kind of distance left in my arm. With a little luck we may be having stunned trout for dinner."
"So what happened?"
"Call it a coincidence in time and space involving flesh and steel in motion. Hurts like hell."
No comments:
Post a Comment