Return of the pry bar

I had lost the pry bar. It went missing somewhere in the 40 acres of woods that is my outdoor sanctuary, where I cut wood and hunt for grouse and deer while watching the natural world pass by slowly and sanely.

The pry bar is 6 feet long, heavy at 16 pounds but lean and mean. I purchased it for $5 at a yard sale 20 some years ago, and ever since it has helped me argue with logs, urging them to roll over so I can reduce them to 18-inch chunks of firewood. The pry bar was my work companion and I’m sure would serve as a weapon in case of an unexpected attack.

I would normally set the pry bar against a tree when not using it, knowing full well if I laid it down it could disappear on the forest floor, which I feared had happened. So I searched that forest floor for nearly 2 years, before leaf fall and through deer hunting and early winter if there was no snow, and in early spring on the forest floor of flattened leaves. I even offered a cash reward during deer hunting for any family members or friends stumbling across it.

It didn’t turn up. I tried to remember every spot where I had cut firewood that fall, and I kept searching those areas. But nothing. I became resigned to the fact that I would never find the pry bar, or that when I did it would be 20 years down the road when I can only walk the woods, not work the woods. I promised myself I wouldn’t curse the late find, but instead pass the tool along to a younger woodcutter who could use it, who would be fortunate to have the same woodland opportunities that I have had.

But it was only two years down the road when one spring day, while surveying the woodlot as it rid itself of the last remnants of winter, when I saw the pry bar leaning against a tree. I couldn’t believe my eyes. Jubilation! I had set the bar so upright that it was hard to see against the big tree trunk, and it was on the opposite side of the narrow tote road that so many of us walked so many times during the hunting seasons.

Reunited, we went back to working together, the pry bar and me, last spring and now into this fall. My work companion had been faithful, staying right where I put it, waiting through the seasons for me to return. Someday someone else will own the pry bar, but not before they know the full story.