Who’s the Chainsaw-Wielding Demon Now?

At college, the professor in charge of the theatrical shop where we were required to work three days a week building the sets and sewing the costumes for the current production, gave us a “Tour de Death” around the workshop. Most of the directions ended with, “And don’t do it wrong because you could lose a finger or hand or limb and die a bloody horrific death, and the university will shut down the shop, and we’ll all have to find new jobs, and theater as we know it will end. Bandaids are in the first aid kit on the wall.”

And thus, a terror of power tools sang through me like that first crash of the organ in Phantom of the Opera.

Because of that fear, I refused to use any of the power saws and barely agreed to touch a drill.

Since I was really bad at building, I ran a lot of errands. The head of the department and I used to joke that together, we added up to one good worker.

For years after I graduated, this fear never challenged me.

And then we moved to North Carolina and pruning emerged as a regular part of our gardening.

My power saw adventures started when I realized that I couldn’t allow the continued obstruction of my front flower garden by the brambles of wild blackberries and random weed trees which emerge like ants from any piece of ignored dirt. Green leaves battered against the small window over the sink in our kitchen, and sunlight fought its way to the larger window where I could spy on our neighbors.

Soon my view would be completely blocked.

I armed myself with long sleeves, thick gloves, and my pruning shears. While most of the branches could be cleared manually, I quickly realized that several of the saplings required…

The chainsaw.

Gah!

Did you know that chainsaws were invented to assist in childbirth?!

Yes, it is a NIGHTMARE!

So, when we end up running together from the chainsaw-wielding demon in our shared dream, we’ll fight him together, right? Or are you faster than me?

Our chainsaw is a petite, cordless number with power that most of the craftsmen in my life would laugh at.

Apprehension riveted my eyes to the blade as my wife explained how to use it.

“Do you know where the chainsaw oil is?”

Gulp. “Yes.” I’d stored it safely for her use. HER use.

“Good. You’ll need to fill the little reservoir. When you want to oil the chain, just hit this button, and run the saw for a moment. That will oil the blade.”

Oh, God.

“You have to hold this other button down for the saw to run.”

That’s nice. A little touch of safety to spice things up!

I filled the reservoir, pulled on my gardening gloves, and headed out to confront the forest that now filled our front garden.

Several small trees crowded the azaleas and the holly tree that bookend our little flower plot. I started with the one next to the azaleas. That way when the chainsaw’s power pulled my arms into a wildly slashing mistake, only a few leaves, maybe a branch, would suffer.

I didn’t want to cut down the holly by accident.

With my abundance of caution and the low power of the machine, I controlled the cuts. The machine wasn’t that hard to manage and made my work so much easier.

Well, color me happy and hang biscuits from my ears!

For the next hour, little trees fell. Exhausted, I returned to the house and collapsed on the sofa.

But I was content. I’d conquered my fear of the chainsaw.

But the nightmare didn’t end.

This year, our holly hedge became a roadway hazard.

Now, I’ve been avoiding dealing with the hedge for the same reason I allowed those trees to overtake my garden plot. While chainsaws held the danger of horror movies, my hedge trimmer trepidation combined a fear of power tools with my fear of water.

How?

Haven’t you ever noticed that hedge trimmers look like one of those crazy sawfish with the long serrated noses?

You know the fish came first. You know some imaginative asshole was out swimming and saw one of those things and thought “Hey! I could use that to prune my hedge!”

What kind of animal are you?!

A human animal. It’s totally a human thing to say.

Following a near-collision with the mail truck, I knew the hedge had to be subdued. The branches there are all pretty small, so I thought my pruning shears could conquer the tangle. A few afternoons of snip-snip-snip and all would be well!

However, 50 feet of rarely managed hedge needs more than a little snip here and there. After only 15, I indulged in several acetaminophen to relieve the pain in my hands and refrained from knitting for a week. When Stephanie received a notice of a hedge trimmer sale, I marched off to the hardware store to confront the aisle of abominations.

The machine from the sale brochure wasn’t even stocked (Yay for big box stores!) but I found a cordless one that seemed comparable. A quick swipe of my credit card and it had a new home.

Making the purchase was all I could manage that day. Charging the battery gave me a respite until my bravery could recharge as well.

Stephanie told me to spray the blades with WD-40 to lubricate them. The safety mechanism was the same as for the chainsaw, and the familiarity soothed me. With a couple of experimental pulls of the trigger, I happily realized it didn’t jump away from me.

I walked up to the bushes and began to cut. The electric motor whirred and the blades chattered as they zipped through the smaller branches. The trimmer purported to cut branches as large as a half-inch, and I tested that to find that they took a little more time, but the trimmer held and so did my hands. In half the time I’d spent trimming manually, I finished what remained.

Confronting the fear of power tools is something I run into all over the place. I’m not sure if it’s maybe combined with the idea that I should be so self-sufficient that I don’t even need power tools? Maybe it’s just the leftovers of a remembered feeling of a power tool leaping and chugging and getting away from me.

Or maybe it’s a memory from another life, one that helped me decide not to have children.

Keep those chainsaws away from my hoo-ha!