Chapter 17

This next morning, I picked Kim up early and we drove to the marina. Mr. McTighe had an early season inspection checklist and we’d promised to run through it before taking the boat out. Bobby, Mel, Lani, and probably Vince, were supposed to meet us at eight and we wanted to be done with the checklist by then. Mr. McTighe hired some of the mechanical work done but we still needed to do a few things.

Kim checked the safety gear, making sure the fire extinguishers hadn’t gone past their date, replaced the CO2 cartridges on the safety vests, checked the first aid kits, and that sort of thing. I started the engine and let it run for a few minutes, then flushed the freshwater tanks and refilled them. We looked over the rigging together. I never would have thought of it but Kim turned on the running lights to make sure they worked. We didn’t plan on being out until dark but it would really suck to have problems, get back late, and discover our lights didn’t work.

By the time they arrived, we were ready to cast off. Kim showed them where they could sit or stand without worrying about getting knocked overboard when we went under sail. She gave them a quick safety brief, including how we would handle a man overboard. Bobby asked Vince if he knew how to swim and got the evil eye for his efforts. None of them had been sailing recently and they were all pretty excited to do it.

We chugged down the Ashley River under power, past the Wappoo Creek and Albemarle Point. With Charleston peninsula on our left, we could see the old homes, including Dr. Calhoun’s beautiful house, across from White Point Garden. People were walking along the battery and Mel waved to them. Bobby smiled because his sweetheart was trying to make friends with people as we motored past. Kim raised the jib first, then eased back on the motor. Drawing even with Fort Johnson, she raised the main sail and killed the motor. Suddenly, it got very quiet.

“Listen,” Lani said. “What do y’all hear?”

“Laughing gulls. I hear a boat horn. It’s probably the Fort Sumter tour boat. Traffic on the point, but just barely,” Vince answered.

“The traffic will fade quickly. Once we get out past Fort Sumter, you won’t hear much besides the wind in the sails, the water against the bow, and birds,” Kim said.

“I’m being quiet,” Mel said, very quietly. We all looked at her and laughed. “I wish it would warm up a bit. I know it will. It’s time to get some tan lines.” Kim and Lani agreed, and Bobby said it would be 80 by ten. They wouldn’t have long to wait.

It was almost nine when we cleared Sullivan’s Island and turned north. We adjusted the sails and picked up speed. By ten, we passed the Isle of Palms and outer clothing began to come off. I took over piloting the boat and set a course for the easternmost point of Bulls Island. The plan was to arrive at Boneyard Beach, anchor, have lunch, then swim ashore to walk around. Kim and I had done it once before but bringing these friends along was fun.

All three girls spread towels out at the bow of the boat and stripped down to their bikinis to get some sun. Vince, Bobby, and I looked at them from a distance. “It’s safer back here,” Bobby said, fanning himself. If I was being honest, I’d like to see Lani’s tits. Mel’s too. There was no way I was going to be honest.

“I don’t know what Mel sees in you, Bobby,” I said.

“Nice, Aquaman. But obviously, Kim sees plenty of good in you,” Vince said.

“Obviously.” We looked at each other for a minute or two. “I don’t have a clue,” I said. We all laughed because it was true.

When we started getting close to our destination, I hollered to Kim. I wanted to get close to shore but I didn’t want to run aground.

“How close in can we go?” I asked.

“Low tide was about an hour ago. I feel safe dropping anchor at eight feet but I don’t trust Daddy’s fathometer. There’s a sounding line in the aft storage, next to the tackle box. Grab that, I’ll drop the sails and take over and we’ll get closer under power.”

I found it and went aft, then dropped it over the side until the line went slack. “Fourteen feet,” I said. She turned toward shore and we eased in, slowly. “Twelve feet.”

“Tell me when it’s ten. I think that will be close enough for everyone.”

When we got to ten feet, she dropped anchor. The anchor chain stretched tight and we were there. Bobby grabbed our picnic basket from below and served up lunch. Sub sandwiches and chips for everyone. We traded sandwiches until we each got one we liked. Mel had about a thousand questions.

“How do we get to the beach?” Lani asked.

“Swim,” I said.

“No. I mean, really, how do we get to the beach?”

“No, I mean we really swim. It’s not that far.”

“But there’s sharks and stuff. There are sharks and stuff, right?”

“Oh, yeah. I forgot,” I said. “We’ll just throw Bobby in and if they don’t eat him, it should be safe for the rest of us.” Bobby laughed.

“I’m serious. I don’t want to get eaten by a shark.”

Vince started up with the theme from Jaws. Lani shoved him, “Knock it off, bozo. We’re going to throw you in first and see if they eat you.”

“Lani,” I said, “Kim and I have done this before. It’s perfectly safe. I know you can swim. No one ever gets eaten by sharks off the coast of Bulls Bay. Hardly ever.”

“Nice, Jack. Hardly ever,” Kim said. “Drop the ladder and jump in. See if they eat you.”

I flipped the ladder down, then put water bottles, flip flops, and a couple of towels into a dry sack. I jumped over the side and Kim tossed the bag to me. “See you on the beach,” I said and started swimming for shore, towing the bag behind me. I looked back once and they were sitting on the deck, dangling their feet over the side.

When I was in shallow water, I stood up and looked back. Kim, Mel, and Bobby were in the water and Vince was holding Lani’s hand preparing to jump in. I got it. There were all kinds of scary things in the ocean. I thought the freeway was a lot scarier, but that’s just me. Even from that distance, I could hear them counting down, and Vince and Lani jumped in. I could hear them laughing and then swimming toward shore.

Once on the beach, I opened the dry sack and set towels and flip flops aside, then pulled a mask and snorkel out. I’d wished I’d had one last time, and this time, I remembered. I waded out, adjusting the straps as I went. Chest deep, I stuck my face in the water and slowly started kicking, staring at the bottom as I went. I turned and saw Kim’s red toenails on the sand in front of me. I ducked under and pulled one and got smacked on the ass for my efforts.

“See anything interesting?” Kim asked when I popped up.

“Sand! That’s it. Just sand. It looks exactly like the beach, except underwater.”

“Now you know.”

I put my face back in the water and swam along looking for anything but sand. I was about to give up when I saw motion on the bottom. I swam toward it and saw a starfish, about six inches across, walking along the bottom. They don’t walk like anything else. I picked him up and hollered for everyone to take a look.

They had all seen dead ones but none of us had ever seen one alive. I looked at the bottom and it looked like a thousand little legs on every one of his five points. I set it on my arm and we watched it walk along, molding itself to my shape.

“Does it hurt? What does it feel like?” Lani asked.

“It doesn’t hurt. It’s lighter than I would have thought. It sort of tickles, I guess. Here,” I said, offering to put it on Lani’s arm.

Swimming ashore must have made her brave. She stuck her arm out and I set him gently on her forearm. We watched him adjust and start walking up her arm at a slow, steady pace.

“Okay, this is weird. He feels funny. He can’t jump or anything weird, can he?”

“Not very far,” I said, and got an elbow from Kim for that. “No. That’s it. Just walk.”

“He’s kind of cute, but he’s getting a little too far up my arm for me.”

Mel took him from her and asked, “He just molds himself to whatever, huh?”

She turned her back to us, so we couldn’t see where she was putting this poor little guy but I had a good idea. She turned back around and he was securely attached to the left cup of her bikini. She laughed, and Bobby shook his head in disbelief. Mel was giddy from laughing and tried to pull him off but he now had a pretty good grip on the fabric.

“Um, Kim?”

“Don’t look at me. This was your idea.” Mel tugged at him and the fabric pulled away a little bit, but not too far.

“I think Bobby’s going to have to save you, Mel.” Bobby arched his eyebrows. “I guess I could,” I offered.

“I’ve got it,” Bobby said, quickly and we all laughed. “You hang onto your top and I’ll hang onto the starfish, or maybe the other way around.”

“You had it right the first time, Mr. Claire,” Mel said, laughing. Bobby had told a joke, I think.

Bobby managed to pull the starfish off without adding embarrassment for Mel, then set him back in the water. We sorted through our stuff. Mel thanked me for finding a starfish and dragging all our stuff ashore and everyone else joined that. A simple matter for Aquaman, Tada!

We stood looking south at the packed flat beach. Palmetto trees were thick at the high-water mark and there were plenty of other trees closer to the ocean. However, those trees were all dead, their trunks and branches worn smooth like driftwood. A few of them were still upright. It stretched for miles that way.

“How did it get this way?” Lani asked

“Erosion, I think,” Kim answered.

“The name Boneyard Beach fits. They look like some weird sort of driftwood tree skeletons.” Lani was obviously glad she came ashore. I’d brought an inexpensive camera with me and it was a lot more useful than the mask and snorkel. I took a couple of pictures of the beach and then we took turns posing in front of tree skeletons. There wasn’t a timer on the camera so we took turns taking pictures of couples and then just guys, and just gals. I should have brought a couple more rolls of film.

“I should have got a picture of the starfish getting fresh with Mel,” I said.

“I’m sure it would have made its way into the yearbook if you had,” Vince said.

“You guys aren’t funny,” Lani said, then, a minute later said, “Okay, that’s actually pretty funny.”

“Mel would have had to sign everyone’s yearbook if that happened,” I said to many eyerolls. That starfish was pretty lucky. Remembering our conversation about fascinating tits, Kim gave me a no-you-can’t look and I laughed.

We walked south together as a group, then split up to walk back as couples. “Why don’t we swim out and bring the boat to shallower water for their swim back?” Kim asked.

“You need me to keep track of the depth, huh? Bobby could bring the dry sack back. Not that big of a deal.”

“No goofing around. Lani was really spooked. Let’s just quietly do it.”

“That’s my fault. I didn’t realize how scared she was. Nobody else had a problem with it, did they?”

“Mel might have but she just went for it. I don’t think it will be tough going back, either, especially after she held the starfish. You get to walk pretty far out before you have to start swimming.”

“Maybe I should give her the mask and snorkel.”

“And risk her seeing something alive? I don’t think so.”

I let Vince and Bobby know what we were going to do, then Kim and I swam back to the boat together. I waited for Kim to climb up, then followed her.

“Were you staring at my ass?”

“Yes.”

“Were you staring at Mel or Lani’s ass earlier?”

“Staring is such a strong word,” I said.

“Brat.”

That settled, she pushed a button and raised the anchor. I went to the bow with the sounding line and called back the depth to her. “We’re not bobbing very much but I don’t want to draw any less than eight feet.”

“We’re at nine,” I hollered back and she dropped anchor. I motioned to them and they started wading out toward the boat. I waited by the ladder to help them aboard. I glanced at Kim and decided they didn’t need my help.

Kim was the most beautiful woman I knew. She was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. Mel was pretty. She was close to beautiful and she had a pretty good figure but the most attractive thing about Mel was her boundless energy and positive attitude. Lani, like her younger sister, was pretty. Really pretty. Not as pretty as Kim, but still, very pretty. But Lani had this tiny waist that somehow changed everything. It made her hips and tits look better. Kim knew that I found that attractive.

The look I got from Kim clearly said that I didn’t need to help anyone, especially Lani, up the ladder. I’m no fool. She could get out on her own. Chivalry was dead.

As soon as they were on board, I raised the ladder, Kim raised the anchor and we were underway. Kim said we were running before a quartering tailwind. She said we could really get moving but she didn’t want to make anyone uncomfortable. I told her we weren’t in a hurry.

“It’s fun to go fast but you need everyone to work together or it can be dangerous.”

“So, not today,” I said.

“Not today. Maybe with my parents when the weather is right. They would enjoy that.”

“What’s the worst that could happen?” I asked.

“We could jibe, knock everyone into the water, and capsize,” she said with a smile.

She wasn’t kidding. “I’m sorry I asked.”

Kim explained how to sail faster than the wind, which didn’t make any sense to me. She said that the fastest boats are just on the edge of losing it. I took her word for it. We were making pretty good time without doing anything dangerous. The other four were up front, talking, laughing and just enjoying the wind in their face.

“This is nice,” I said. “I’m enjoying just about everything about this.”

“Me too, and I’m still sort of buzzing from last night,” she answered, smiling up at me. “I can’t believe you licked chocolate syrup off my tits.”

“Yeah. You’re tasty enough without the chocolate. Are we going to be doing this in five years, or ten?”

“The six of us? I hope so. Maybe. Mel is rooted right here. I think Lani is too, but I don’t know about Vince or Bobby. Vince is probably going where the opportunities are.”

“Vince went to Notre Dame for one semester. That’s where the opportunity was but he’s back,” I said.

“You think he’s back to stay?”

“Where does Coastal Carolina fit on your list of top college choices?” It didn’t. The only reason Vince went there was because he had a chance to play football so that his dad could see him compete at the college level. “I hate to say it but I don’t think Vince’s dad is going to last long. At least that’s my understanding. Then, I think he’ll stay close to home for his mom.”

“And since Lani has roots here, he has a reason to stay close.”

“I think so. That leaves Bobby,” I said, looking up at him.

“What’s he going to do?”

“I honestly don’t think he knows, Baby. Not yet. If he stays with accounting, he can do that anywhere. I think Mel sort of blindsided him. He wasn’t expecting to have a woman complicate things for him.”

“Mel? Complicating? Ha. Mel would be happy to stay right here. In fact, I think she’d be happy to take over for her mom, teaching English. At the same time, there are only two categories of people in the world. People who are friends with Mel, and people Mel hasn’t met yet.”

“So, if Bobby wanted to go to college or take a job in Seattle...”

“She’d adjust.”

“This is definitely one of those cases where I don’t want to counsel, or guide, or influence them,” I said.

“Unless they ask for it. Then you should tell them to stay.”

“Because you want them to.”

“Reason enough,” Kim said, smiling. “Coming up on Sullivan’s Island. At this time of day, it’s going to get crowded. We may have to go in under power. We’ll see. Let them know, would you?”

It was approaching six on a beautiful Saturday evening and the harbor was busy. Kim dropped sails, turning the corner under power. She said powered boats are lowest on the totem pole when it came to right of way but it was simply easier when it was that crowded. She was in charge and I didn’t know any better but this seemed like a tabletop discussion for later. Stand-on vessels, and give-way vessels, and a list of six categories of boats was too much to figure out while we were doing it. Kim knew, and that’s all that mattered.

Approaching the marina, I tried to estimate the current. It was close to high tide and the water seemed almost stationary. Kim was focused and knew what she was doing. She was fun to watch when she was tracked, probably because she had no idea I was watching. We eased up to the dock, I jumped out and tied us off as she swung the aft end of the boat around. Bobby jumped out at the back end and held the rope.

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” he said.

I showed him how to tie the boat off, how to tie the spring line, how much slack to leave for the tides, and where to put the fenders. He tied off the aft line and the boat was secure. He was happy with that. Considering that we’d been out for about ten hours, we didn’t have a lot of stuff.

“Oh, look, I found my shoes,” Kim said, holding up the sandals she’d been wearing on New Year’s Eve. She’d known where they were the whole time but this was her excuse to start wearing them again.

“Oh, girl, you got some sun,” Mel said to Lani. Lani had pulled her bikini strap to the side to see a very white line against her pink skin.

“I’m pretty sure we all did. I hope I don’t pay for this.”

After securing Inherit the Wind, and dragging all our stuff back to the cars, we stood around debating what we would do with the rest of our day. After a full day together, none of us were tired of each other’s company and we weren’t ready for it to end. It doesn’t get much better than that.

“Marco’s,” Vince said. “I’m starving.”

“Vince is stuck with Conway food most of the time. We should go where he wants,” I said.

“Right,” he laughed. “Because there aren’t any good restaurants in Myrtle Beach.” Myrtle Beach was full of good restaurants and was very close to Conway and Coastal Carolina, where he went to school.

We went to Marco’s on John’s Island. Driving there, I asked Kim, “Why do you think we call everything an island? James Island, Johns Island, Sullivan’s Island, Folly Island and Kiawah Island aren’t islands. Some of them aren’t even peninsulas.”

“Maybe the early settlers thought they were.”

“You did great today, mi Capitan,” I said.

“Thanks. It was fun.”

Inside, we ordered a couple of large pizzas and a pitcher of Coke. We talked about sailing and Boneyard Beach. I told them about how it all looked different from the air, since Kim and I had gone flying over the area a year before. They agreed that the same beaches and even downtown Charleston looked different from the water and it was fun to see it that way.

Conversation ranged over a bunch of subjects, frequently coming back to Boneyard Beach, shells someone had found, sailing, and the eighteen-foot alligator rumored to be living in Jacks Creek, only a quarter of a mile from the beach we’d been walking on. Lani hadn’t known about that or she probably wouldn’t have gone to the island.

It grew quiet. “Sally moved here from San Diego then off to Nashville. Angela and Karen are from San Diego. Dane is from Rhode Island. Marie is from Spain or something. Are all of us from right here?” I asked. We all were. “Kim and I will be gone to college for a couple of years but you know where we’ll be when we get done. We’ll be on Fort Johnson Road. I don’t think Mom and Dane are going anywhere. I don’t think Kim’s folks are moving.”

“What’s on your mind, Aquaman?” Mel asked.

“The four of you.”

“Here, Lani said. Family is here. I like it here. I’d need a pretty good reason to move,” she said, looking at Vince, sitting next to her.

“Same,” Mel said.

“I’d like to end up at MUSC or one of their kajillion satellite offices,” Vince said. “So, here. I don’t see a reason to go somewhere else.” Lani smiled at that.

We all turned to Bobby. “Here. I’ve been to twenty or thirty states and a lot of Europe. There are a lot of nice places but I like it here just fine. Here.”

“You’ve been to thirty states?” Mel asked.

“I think that’s about right. More than half.”

“That’s crazy. Where? Which states?” Mel asked. They’d been dating almost as long as Kim and I and this was the first she’d heard of it.

“All up and down the east, except for West Virginia, Vermont, and Delaware, I think. California, Washington, and Oregon on the west coast. Then, a couple of states along the Canadian border. Oh, and Hawaii.”

“I had no idea. Where did you like it the best?” Mel asked.

“Oh, man, that’s a tough one. Let’s see. New York City has some amazing delicatessens, and in Greenwich Village, you can go to a bakery, buy a loaf of fresh bread, then go next door to a meat market and they’ll make a subway sandwich for you. Super fresh. I can smell the bread. New Haven Connecticut had amazing pizza but so did Chicago. Ah, and Chinatown in San Francisco has some incredible restaurants. If you’re the only person there that doesn’t speak Chinese, it’s probably authentic, right?”

“Do you remember anything about where you’ve been besides the food?” Mel asked, and we all laughed.

“No. Not really,” Bobby answered, but he was smiling. “There’s a snack shop at Mount Rushmore that has Hagen Daz ice cream, oh and we had Vietnamese at a little restaurant on Hotel Street in Honolulu that was fantastic.”

“I’m going to order another pizza,” Vince said and raised his hand to get the waiter’s attention.

“You’re a mess, Bobby Claire. I want to know about the places, not just the food.”

For the next thirty minutes, Bobby told Mel, and the rest of us, how New York City had lots of people, and plays, and restaurants, but the people were rude, the subways were loud, and it was far too crowded. He told her about Seattle and rain, and a dozen other places. He’d been snorkeling in Hawaii and that was one of the highlights. It was the most I’d ever heard Bobby talk. Mel hadn’t even asked him about Europe.

“I don’t mean to interrupt the Bobby Claire travelog but do I understand that all four of you plan to end up right back here in Charleston, regardless of where you go to college? Is that right?” Kim asked.

“I guess it is,” Lani said, looking around and everyone nodded.

“Okay then, get a notepad out or something to write with,” I said. No one had that. “Plan to meet us at our Johnson Road house on Saturday, June 18^th, 1990. Kim will be the last one done with school and we’ll have a big party.”

“You have got to be kidding me, Aquaman. I believe in planning ahead but that’s nuts,” Vince said. Kim had found a notepad in her purse and was writing it down. She tore off a sheet and handed it to Mel. Mel nodded solemnly and stuck it in her pocket.

Kim and Mel had been keeping straight faces. Bobby always kept a straight face. “He’s messing with you,” Bobby said. Vince sighed. “June 18^th, 1990 is a Wednesday. Let’s try for the 21^st.”

“Alright, now you’re messing with me,” Vince said. I lost it, then Kim lost it. Mel kept her straight face as she pulled the note out of her pocket and changed the date.

Bobby looked up at us with a straight face and asked, “What? The 21^st is a Saturday. That’s what you meant, right?”

“I think that’s accountant humor, Vince. He keeps me in stitches,” Mel said.

“I want to ask but, I sort of don’t,” I said. “Do you think, nah, never mind.”

“Do you think we’ll be together on whatever day is a Saturday in 1990?” Vince asked. I nodded. He looked at Lani. “There’s a good possibility, I’d say.”

“Oh, really?” Lani asked. “A good possibility?”

“Oh, oh. Help me out, guys.”

“Not me. I withdrew the question before I asked it. You’re on your own.”

“What about you, Bobby?” Vince asked as he fended off Lani’s fake punches.

“No misdirection, bucko,” Lani said.

“Hey, how about a Fresca?” Kim said and we all laughed. I think we’d all seen Caddyshack, and that was a funny line to change the subject.

As we walked out to the parking lot together, I noticed Mel squeeze Bobby’s hand and he squeezed back. They were thinking about it.

As we drove back to Kim’s house I asked, “What do you think?”

“I think Vince already asked Lani, even if he didn’t. Moving back from his first-choice college sends a girl a pretty strong message. Mel loves Bobby in a major way. She says he cherishes her. I’d say the odds are in their favor. What do you think?”

“I think Bobby’s the big question. There’s no doubt that he loves Mel. I’m not sure if he can deal with her energy level. He’s becoming a little more outgoing but it wears him out. I think if she gives him the room to relax, you know, some alone time, then he’ll probably see that for what it’s intended. I think if Bobby ignored Mel, she’d freak out. But if Mel ignored Bobby for a while, he’d welcome the quiet. Does that sound right?”

“It’s that big of a deal?”

“I think so. You’ve found me alone at The Cut a couple of times and you just came out and sat next to me without talking. You get it. If Mel gets it like that, I think they’ll be good.” I could see Kim thinking that through, undoubtedly analyzing her friend and trying to figure if she could help make that happen.

“I think it might be a balancing act for Mel, at least for a while.”

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“You like chocolate as much as I do, right? I know you do. Can you have too much of it? As much as I love chocolate, there’s a point where it’s just too much. I think Mel is like that for Bobby. A little Mel is a good thing. A little more Mel is even better, but too much Mel is really rough.”

“There’s a sweet spot,” she said.

“I see what you did, there. Yeah, there’s a sweet spot. At least I think so. Bobby’s not going to stop being Bobby and if Mel stopped being Mel, I don’t think Bobby would be attracted. At least he wouldn’t be as attracted. She can’t change who she is and shouldn’t try. I know Bobby and you know Mel and they know each other but maybe there’s a blind spot we can help them with.”

“Have you been reading Psychology Today?” she asked, laughing. “Are you still planning on clearing tomorrow?” I nodded. “I’m going to pick up Angela in the morning. We’ll do some riding together and then I want to practice barrel for a while. She loves to watch and she’ll help. Are you going to miss me?”

“Yeah. No such thing as too much Kim,” I said as I pulled into her driveway. I leaned over to kiss her and she stopped me.

“Jack, you’ll tell me if I have a blind spot, right? If Mel has one, maybe I do, too.”

“I’d tell you. Same?” She squeezed my hand; we kissed and she went in. There was no such thing as too much Kim.

Sunday morning, I was out on the property early. I cut down a couple of dozen sweetgum trees. They must be related to rabbits or something because there were just so many. I don’t think any of them had a trunk greater than two inches in diameter so it was easy work. Then, I cut down a half dozen magnolias. Part of me hated to cut them down but they were mangled and half dead and I knew that by getting rid of them, other trees near them would do better.

I had a trail marked and it was pretty easy to clear the path, but there was one pine tree that was going to be a problem. I tried to figure out some way to avoid cutting it down but nothing else made sense. We had plenty of pine trees, so cutting one down wasn’t a big deal. Except this pine tree was tall. If I didn’t cut it down, I’d either have to put a ninety degree turn in the trail or make three other turns or cut a lot more trees and I really wanted a lengthy straightaway so we could canter and this was it.

I’d never cut down a tree that tall and I took my time planning it. I made an estimate on its height, then shaped a couple of cut branches into an X and put them where I wanted the top of the pine tree to land. I thought my estimate on height was pretty good and walked it off. Eighty feet. I laughed when I thought about what kind of a whump it would make when it landed. I was ready to start cutting and decided to play it safe. I took off my chaps and gloves and drove a block down the street and told Franklin what I was going to do. His eyes bugged out and he eagerly came back with me.

I’m sure he thought I was going to do it anyway and Mom would kill him if I killed myself and then she’d be childless. I told him my plan and we walked the area together. He couldn’t think of a better solution either. He said he’d watch and let me know if it seemed like I was about to do something stupid, like cut down an eighty-foot pine tree.

Franklin watched as I geared up, and made a horizontal cut into the tree at knee height. I checked the angle a couple of times to make certain I was pointing the tree fall in the right direction. If it went the wrong way, it wasn’t going to hurt anything. It would just make cleanup a pain in the ass. Besides, I wanted to see how close I could put it to my X. With my first cut made, I cut a notch out at about a thirty-degree angle, then knocked the wedge out. I checked my angles again and it still looked good.