Each summer a mountain takes over my driveway, and it’s my job to carry away the mountain.
The mountain is as tall as I am, as long as a sedan, and as wide as two cars parked side by side. The mountain is made of wood—2 cords of firewood. Once stacked in the woodshed along the side of the house, the wood will be ready to keep us warm over the winter (and we can park in the driveway again).
But it’s got to be stacked first. So piece by piece, load by load, I move the mountain.
It’s a lot of wood to tackle. Sometimes I’m amazed that it’s all going to get moved. Then I remind myself that yes, it will all get moved, though not all at once. I have a system, see:
4 loads a day.
No more, no less (well, okay, sometimes I do an extra load or two, when inspired). Each day, rain or shine, I pack a wheelbarrow with firewood 4 times, and stack each load in the woodshed. It’s good work. It gets me outside. And every year, it teaches and reinforces a valuable lesson about writing:
Bit by bit, word by word, piece by piece—that’s how it all gets done.
Everyone has a writing aphorism, an analogy that helps them comprehend and shoulder the load of working on a project, be it a short story, a hefty article or a long novel. I remind myself that words are like firewood, and cords of wood are no different than large writing projects.
Just as I can’t knock out a novel in a day or even in a week, I can’t stack two cords of firewood in that kind of time either. But each day I can move 4 wheelbarrow-loads. Load by load, day by day, eventually all that firewood gets stacked in the shed, ready for winter.
Large projects are just a composite of little tasks, done consistently. Instead of writing a 90,000-word travel fantasy novel, I write 1,000 words a day. Or, for projects such as articles or website copy, instead of knocking out a long article in a day, I set up an outline one day, research and interview on another day, draft on the day after that, and then take a final day to revise, polish and finish.
Move the mountain, year after year.
Big projects are too big for a day. Many are too big for a week. But the little-by-little component tasks? Those can fit in a day.
Stacking firewood reminds me that if I just tackle the right amount at a time, even big jobs are in my grasp. Bit by bit, the mountain gets moved—and things get done.
Then, every year, it starts up again. There will always be another winter to keep warm in, so there will always be another summer where a mountain of firewood needs to be moved and stacked. Whether as a 1,000 words or 100,000 words, so too will every year need more stories told.
And wood by wood, word by word, day by day, I can get them done.
Photo: Thilo Leibelt
Inspiring, Anthony. Moving firewood is a great analogy. Thanks for this.