The smell of the juniper and cedar fills my lungs as we drive deep into the woods of Warm Springs. Our wood cutting map and tags sitting askew on the dashboard, sipping on our hot cup of coffee brewed by Josh’s mom. We find one of our designated wood cutting spots and haul out all our gear to set up. Putting on our helmets, ear and eye protectors, Josh tells me what his grandpa always told him “never trust a working man with gloves, as he’s always spending time either putting them on or looking for them” Josh chuckles and shakes his head ruefully as he slips on his gloves. He then takes some time to calibrate his saw before he gets started on felling our chosen tree. Then comes limbing and cutting into rounds and then we’re hard at work rolling and lifting
each round onto the back of the truck. By mid-day we’ve worked up a good sweat and loaded the bed of the truck to max weight capacity. We take off our gear and sit for a while on the tailgate, breathing in the cedar scent now made stronger after cutting the tree and listening to the sounds of the forest.

During these times we often think about and talk about the men in our lives that impacted us and are no longer with us. Josh’s grandpa, who was a renowned cowboy and leatherworker, always seemed to have gems of life advice for his family and grandsons. He died of pneumonia just after Josh started college. He was an extremely hard worker and handyman, who taught Josh how to drive stick on an old lumbering chevy truck and showed Josh how to cut wood.

For me, I think about my grandpa Bob, who died of colon cancer when I was just a year old. He was the foreman at our Warm Springs mill for decades and one of the patriarchs among my family. He too was a handyman and a wily rascal as I hear my family tell it. I also think about my stepdad Lee who died of a heart attack just over a decade ago. He grew up in Warm Springs and was a construction worker for most of his life. He took me on some job sites with him and helped me believe that I could do anything.  

When we go out on these excursions, I feel like in some part we’re paying homage to these loved ones that did this work with us and would have loved to continue to do this work with us. In these quiet moments on our land and with each other, grief and love and remembrance move quietly through
us and I feel the touch and love of many of our loved ones that are no longer here.

After we finish our snacks and our visiting, we drive back to Josh’s moms house and begin the rest of the wood processing for firewood. Josh’s younger brother, Thunder, has gotten pretty good at cutting wood over the years. Once the firewood is split and we have a pile of kindling, we stack it all. Then we check in with family that needs any firewood and we make the delivery.

At the end of the day, this is what we’re doing it all for, our family.

When Josh had the idea to turn this into an actual small business, I was very skeptical. This is just something we’ve always done, something our families have always done. But then he shared more of his idea, how what we’ve always done is just the inspiration for this larger vision that tackled sustainable forestry practices and giving back to the community.

And that’s when it felt like something slid into place for me. Like this feeling of rightness and clarity, like this was just the next evolution in our family’s journey. And we feel that our family is walking with us, every step of the way.

-Rosa Frutos