Destruction, deconstruction, making use of..

I think I previously included in this blog our other preoccupation, dealing with aftermath of floods at our place Mount Eurobodalla but have not shown what we have been doing since, see below little movie...

It has become a stimulating and inspiring process, not a burdensome clean-up. I have been very fortunate in finding an artist with a chain saw, David, and we have not only been cleaning up but making new building materials...

I've had a turn, but am mainly accessory. It's good to work with someone who is focused on at least three things at a time, and to be in agreement that the precise use of this material, is something to be determined when we have the products, of which these some samples...we begin with these slabs from paulownia, heading next for the eucalypt that knocked this tree down, see the movie. Below the fork in the big gum tree in that movie there and in photo below, showing trench being dug to get at it, is at least 8.5 metres of straight timber, and above the fork a great deal more. There is another carried-in log of immense whorling complexity, we need courage to decide how to work on it, as slabs lengthwise or across. This paulownia is very simple to decide about!

Fun to re-use: the ancient little caravan, with which we began here 20 years ago, now serving as a timber jinker and as rough support for tarpaulins to cover cut lumber.

This is the big eucalypt referred to above, which we get at next... the not-long-enough wooden rail on top is 7.2 metres.

I had shared a view with a neighbour, in April: we both thought there would be another flood in June. Well, in the first week of June another five inches of rain, following five in the last week of May, and a cyclone in between, so maybe flood at any moment.

The lumber I made safe before the cyclone, but the shed could not be safe when wind lifts the top off a tree and throws it at the shed... So another task ahead in fixing/replacing the shed. Fortunately not the house.

In the picture below, the water is just run-off, not flood. While I was taking this picture below, two very large trees fell fifty metres away, at a time when, 7.30am, there was neither wind nor rain, see my story of it here, if you missed the link the other day!! :-)

I like this way of living in a creative mindset in very direct engagement with natural reality, where you are not in charge, there are other forces, metaphorically comparable to the way the novel runs away from me, stories take charge, characters take charge.