Saw Therapy

As Christmas approaches I protect myself from paralysis by cliche by - weather permitting - daily saw therapy. The smaller branches that were attached to the huge limb, torn off one of our beech trees in last May's storm, are gradually being reduced to firewood. Beech makes an excellent fuel. The fine twigs are ideal for kindling and the logs, laid on a single layer of coal, blaze brightly before being reduced to a soft, fine ash that fertilizes.

Saw therapy only works if you use a manual implement. Men, the main sawers in this area, prefer power saws. Their whining and groaning (the saws', not the men's) is to my mind devils' music that overpowers and replaces the comforting rhythm of old-fashioned sawing.

The therapeutic effects are not confined to rhythm. I have reprieved pieces of wood from being burned because of the subtle beauty of their bark. Among them were long digits whose skin gleamed with the pink of newly minted copper or the orange tint of copper alloy. They were adorned at intervals with finely-ridged metallic bands and marked with patches of silver grey containing dark microflecks and microstreaks. they had dark lenticel pores in the centre of tiny goosepimples, or small raised rhombuses, or between two tiny lips.

No two pieces of wood are the same. For me, humble beech wood rescues me from pre-Christmas boredom and is a symbol of the unlimited possibilities in Creation.