Progress is being made

After the carnage of three weeks ago (reported here) things have been looking up, albeit frustratingly slowly.

A follow up hospital visit discovered fluids had pooled in one lung so that required the medical equivalent of a Roto-Rooter procedure to drain and an overnight stay but otherwise the ribs are healing nicely and I have weaned myself off the painkillers (I hated how they made me feel). Also during that second visit a CT scan confirmed that it was 7 ribs fractured, not just 5. I’m not sure if it actually makes any difference but 7 always seems better than 5 unless one is playing golf, which I am most definitely not at this time.

The insurance company has been great with arrangements made to repair the garage roof and house damage and I have a cash settlement in hand for other insured losses. Unfortunately there is no insurance coverage for property clean-up. When I suggested such a clause, with a cap of $2500 or $5000, might be a useful inclusion in rural policies my agent’s response was, “Well it doesn’t happen very often.” Exactly. Isn’t that what we have insurance for, those events that don’t happen very often? And according to municipal and provincial officials the “disaster” wasn’t big enough (i.e. not enough homes were destroyed and there was no loss of life) so there’s no help available from them either. So we are on our own when it comes to the clean-up of the 100 or so felled trees and associated damage in the 2 or 3 acres directly around our home.

While I am mobile and can get around fine any strenuous activity, heavy lifting, chainsawing remains a distant objective. Without the help of friends and neighbours the clean-up would not have progressed at all in the past 3 weeks. The day after I got home from my initial hospital visit neighbours came by and cleared our driveway so at least we could drive up to the house. Another friend who owns some heavy equipment has been here most days clearing some of the larger trees out of the way. Even the missus has pitched in, learning to use the small chain saw to clear the downed trees off her flower beds. And I have actually been turning down some offers of help simply because I don’t feel right having others work on my property while I sit there and supervise. So a big THANK YOU to all who have helped and offered to do so.

And so it goes. We pick away at it a bit at a time while we wait for the fire ban to be lifted so we can begin to burn the tons of branches, small trees, and other waste left after the good white pine and cedar logs have been removed and the hardwood segregated for next year’s (and beyond) firewood. And then we start to replant.

 

This tree snapped off 30’ above the ground, landing on my garage roof.

 

Can’t imagine clearing this by hand.

 

A few of the logs taken off the property.
A similar sized pile is across the road.