[Listen]

[Intro music plays]

[Woman’s Voice]

This is Behind the Cut with Christopher Gronlund. The companion show to Not About Lumberjacks.

[Music fades out]

Christopher Gronlund:

Behind the Cut is an in-depth look at the latest episode of Not About Lumberjacks and often contains spoilers from the most recent story. You’ve been warned…

* * *

Halloween is my favorite holiday (and takes place during my favorite month), but Christmas is a close second. (And I’m rather fond of December as well.)

Growing up, Christmas Eve meant visiting my mom’s mom and then Christmas day at home with immediate family.

Later, my father moved to a suburb south of Kansas City, which meant a couple Christmases were spent in the Sunflower state. I’ve also spent many a mash-up of Christmas and Hannukah with my Jewish cousins.

These days, my wife and I visit my mom on Christmas Eve and then spend Christmas day together. (Usually getting in a morning hike.)

None of this is too out of the ordinary, except…I’m a life-long atheist.

So, why do I do an annual Christmas episode and not an all-encompassing generic holidays thing?

The short answer is most popular Christmas stories are not overtly religious. Growing up, the closest it got to religious was Linus’s speech in A Charlie Brown Christmas. But A Christmas Carol, A Christmas Story, the Rankin/Bass stop-motion specials, Elf, and even—depending on who you ask—Die Hard, are quite secular.

The longer answer is this…

* * *

Six years ago, I had an idea: I’d do something with all those story ideas that din’t merit 3,000 – 10,000 words. I’d put together an episode with shorter short stories.

It just-so-happened that I decided to do it around Christmas.

The idea was originally called “Stocking Stuffers,” with all those bits of very short fiction being the short story equivalent of something found in a stocking on Christmas morning.

It seemed only natural to include at least one Christmas story in the episode.

* * *

Another reason I love doing an annual Christmas episode is each year I see someone I know through social media talking about “The War on Christmas.” They act like no one is allowed to say, “Merry Christmas,” anymore—how it’s now “Happy Holidays.”

Never mind that there are many holidays during this time of year, and never mind that the free market so many of these Scrooges claim to love realized being a bit more inclusive of additional celebrations is good for business. And never mind that many of my Christian friends say, “Happy Holidays,” just like people have been doing for more than 100 years.

So, when I—a life-long atheist—tell them I say “Merry Christmas”—and even do an annual Christmas episode for my fiction podcast—it destroys their false narrative that we somehow want to topple the holiday we all love.

* * *

So why, then, do I not write stories about other holidays taking place this time of year?

Well…

Even though I’ve celebrated Hannukah with family, I’m not Jewish—I don’t feel that’s not my story to tell. (And really, the most memorable Jewish holiday for me was Passover because my aunt was a good cook and went all-out on that!)

I’m not a pagan, so basing a December episode around Yule or the Winter Solstice isn’t happening. (Although I have worked in some Scandinavian, German, and Welsh lore based on pagan roots into past Christmas episodes—but I’ve never featured an actual holiday.)

Just as I feel I’m not the right voice for a Hannukah story, I’m not going to write about Kwanzaa, Ramadan in the years it occurs during December, Bodhi Day, or other holidays I don’t celebrate.

I suppose if I anchored the annual December episode with a New Year’s Eve or Day story, I might call it a holiday episode, but I’m now committed to Christmas.

* * *

Author John Green did a YouTube video about a year ago on the subject of committing to a bit.

He talked about a musician named Jonathan Mann who’s written and shared a song a day on YouTube for over 10 years. (As of the time of this writing on December 13, 2023, he’s released song number 5,460!)

John talked about how he and his brother Hank worked in every word from the lyrics to Smash Mouth’s song, “All Star,” into their YouTube video titles for a time.

He mentioned Dolly Smith, a British woman who had not missed a match of her beloved Derby County Football/Soccer Club in over 70s years. (As a Leicester City supporter, even I can appreciate that! [Derby County is one of Leicester’s bigger rivalries.])

John’s right: there is something about committing to a bit!

With Not About Lumberjacks, I’m now committed to an annual lumberjack story each November in honor of the show’s anniversary. (Even though some fans have done mental gymnastics in jest to tell me why the stories are still not about lumberjacks.)

Last year, I committed to a new bit: adding an annual story (in print, even), to patrons of my Patreon.

And the annual Christmas episode is committing to a bit.

The great thing about these commitments is, in time, you have little bodies of works inside a larger body of work.

Were I to self-publish books, I likely have enough lumberjack stories for a collection.

I likely have enough Christmas stories for a collection.

And, in time, I’ll have enough Patreon-only “Well-Rooted Grove” stories to share as a collection. (Likely, for a free episode of the show in a handful of years when there are enough stories for that.)

Doing back-to-back monthly episodes in the middle of the busy holiday season and rush to close out a year at work is not my best idea, but I’m committed to the bit at this point.

* * *

I thought the annual Christmas episode would be a one-time thing the first year I did it. Nothing said I had to continue, but people like it, so I have.

Nothing said I had to commit to annual lumberjack stories or this other thing I now apparently do in May for Patreon patrons.

To spin it all back to Christmas and me, it’s a gift that people think highly enough about the stories I write, narrate, and release that they give me a bit of their time in a world where there are a bazillion other things they could focus on.

A new season of Not About Lumberjacks begins each year in November with the anniversary episode, but there’s always something special about closing out the calendar year.

It’s a time for reflection and many holidays all stacked up together.

No matter what you celebrate—or don’t—I wish you mighty health and fun in the new year…

And Merry Christmas!

* * *

Thank you for listening to Not About Lumberjacks and Behind the Cut. Theme music for Behind the Cut is a tune called “Reaper” by Razen. Visit nolumberjacks.com for information about the music, the episodes, and voice talent.

Also, for as little as a dollar a month, you can have access to a bigger behind-the-scenes look at Not About Lumberjacks on Patreon. Check out patreon.com/cgronlund if that sounds like your kinda thing.

With back-to-back monthly episodes, now begins the annual wait for March. (But I still tend to get things out earlier in the month, so it’s not too much longer than usual.)

So, what can you expect for the next story? How about a tale called “Not Again,” in which a guy makes a time machine, takes it back to 1983 for a test run, and ends up breaking down in his past?

Until next time: be mighty, and keep your axes sharp!

[Listen]

[Intro music plays]

[Woman’s Voice]

This is Behind the Cut with Christopher Gronlund. The companion show to Not About Lumberjacks.

[Music fades out]

Christopher Gronlund:

Behind the Cut is an in-depth look at the latest episode of Not About Lumberjacks and likely contains spoilers of the most recent story. You’ve been warned…

* * *

Second-person present tense point of view is strange to me. On one hand, I’ve been using it since 1979, when a friend introduced me to Dungeons and Dragons when I was 10. Using “You”—as in, “You hear the sound of small, wooden wheels rolling across damp cobbles. You trace the lonely sound to a hunched figure bundled in rags, pushing a rickety wooden cart through the fog.”—puts the players right there in the scene. For the game, it’s second nature to me.

But while I grew up in the time of Choose Your Own Adventure books, known for their second person point of view, I preferred reading the books my older sister, mom, and stepdad read instead of books written for me and my age at the time.

I’ve never written a story using the point of view until writing the recent Not About Lumberjacks story, “Old Growth.”

* * *

Originally, the protagonist for “Old Growth” was going to be a female lumberjack trapped on the side of a mountain with some kind of creature. The story idea came to be when my wife told me she watched a TV show about the Ape Canyon Bigfoot attack on miners in 1924. It was not a big leap from, “Miners under attack on Mount St. Helens,” to “Something’s attacking lumberjacks in an old growth forest in the Pacific Northwest.”

Of course, I had to run with that. So, I made a female lumberjack and couldn’t wait to get started.

Along the way, though, I saw author John Green reading an excerpt from his latest novel-in-progress. It was in second person.

“That’s what I should do for ‘Old Growth!’” I thought. “Put the listener or reader right there, like it’s happening to them!”

* * *

Obviously, Not About Lumberjacks stories are about things that mean something to me. Perhaps the biggest recurring theme is work/life balance or finding time for your dreams despite a world that makes many demands in opposition of those things. It’s no secret that I’d rather do this show full time than be a technical writer, but…being a technical writer isn’t so bad, especially when it allows me the security to write whatever I want, here, with no regard to financial considerations. But I like to think Not About Lumberjacks stories aren’t preachy, even when they are a bit more focused on topics dear to me.

Disguised (or maybe not) in September’s story, “Lakeview Estates,” is commentary about the housing crisis in the United States—how even if one can afford a house, depending where they live, they now have to bid against multi-national conglomerates running property management companies. “Old Growth” is an obvious statement about environmental destruction at the hands of humans, and probably as in-your-face as I’ll ever get. (And even then, I wanted the story to be more entertaining than anything.)

* * *

Choosing to use “You” instead of a character name worked with what I hoped to do with “Old Growth” before I even knew what it would really be about. I knew I wanted to rely on the sounds to create an experience, while of course being interesting enough for those who read Not About Lumberjacks stories instead of listening. People loved the sounds in “Rockbiters,” and I wanted to put in that kind of effort again.

Knowing I wanted to put a bit more than usual into the sounds of “Old Growth,” once I made that decision, opting for a second person point of view only made sense. It’s a story with a message, so the combination of sounds drawing you in and speaking directly to you…it seemed like it would carry more weight. At the very least, be a bit creepier since it’s happening to “you” and not just some random character.

* * *

While “Old Growth” is the first second-person point of view story I’ve written, I’ve thought about using it with another episode I’ve not yet done. Around the time of the release of “Godspeed, Crazy Mike,” I ordered a couple “Choose Your Own Adventure” books for research. I toyed with the idea of a father reading that kind of tale to his son, with some options resulting in a much stranger story. Maybe even releasing a separate PDF where YOU could be led through a story of your own choosing.

Beyond that, I don’t see writing other stories using that point of view. I have nothing against it, but when I mentioned it to Cynthia, she said, “When you do the usual content advisory for ‘Old Growth,’ you might want to mention it’s a bit of a departure with the point of view.”

She was not the only one to mention the departure.

Depending what you read, second person is maybe not common, but also not uncommon. Sci-Fi and Fantasy use it to great effect. The third book in Jeff Vandermeer’s Southern Reach trilogy, Acceptance, is in second person. N.K. Jemisin’s The Fifth Season shifts points of view in the same novel—and she’s uses it in other works as well. But second person isn’t reserved for only sci-fi and fantasy: Jay McInerney’s Bright Lights, Big City addresses “You” directly, a so-called “serious work” in second-person.

* * *

When I set out to write “Old Growth,” I thought writing in second-person would be as simple as replacing “I” or a character’s name with “You.” And in many ways, it was.

As I worked on the story, though, considering the point of view made me think about the protagonist and what they felt and saw a bit more than usual. The story felt more personal than it would have, had I chosen a third- or first-person point of view. It was easier to think about what I wanted listeners and readers to hear and feel.

I usually write from my gut and always do give thought to what I want people to feel. Still, using “Lakeview Estates” as an example: I wanted you to feel for the characters and the situations they faced, but there’s still a layer of separation when reading about characters you don’t personally know.

With “Old Growth,” I wanted the story to feel more personal, like it was happening to YOU!

I hope YOU enjoyed it…

* * *

Thank you for listening to Not About Lumberjacks and Behind the Cut. Theme music for Behind the Cut is a tune called “Reaper” by Razen. Visit nolumberjacks.com for information about the music, the episodes, and voice talent.

Also, for as little as a dollar a month, you can have access to a bigger behind-the-scenes look at Not About Lumberjacks on Patreon. Check out patreon.com/cgronlund if that sounds like your kinda thing.

In December, it’s the annual Christmas episode. That means you get a handful of very short short stories, and at least one bigger story tied directly to the holiday season.

Until next time: be mighty, and keep your axes sharp!

[Listen]

[Sound of an ax chopping wood. Quirky music fades in…]

Christopher Gronlund:

I want to make one thing perfectly clear: this show is not about lumberjacks…

My name is Christopher Gronlund, and this is where I share my stories. Sometimes the stories contain truths, but most of the time, they’re made up. Sometimes the stories are funny—other times they’re serious. But you have my word about one thing: I will never—EVER—share a story about lumberjacks.

This time, it’s a second-person point of view tale in which YOU are a lumberjack!

But first, the usual content advisory…

“Old Growth” deals with death, gore, anguish, being lost in a forest, being alone in the dark, and…creatures. Despite all that I’m back to another episode without swearing. Look, it’s an environmental horror story about finding a sense of balance, okay! It’s not even gory at every turn…more just…creepy in its intent.

Before getting into the tale, I want to thank everyone for supporting Not About Lumberjacks and helping make this episode…the 50^th full story episode of the show!

Yep, the big 50!

And to honor the occasion, I’m doing a giveaway without making you jump through too many hoops or forcing you to share things online and tagging people—I’m not a big fan of that. (Although you’ll get an extra chance if you do…share things, that is—But seriously, I’m not gonna make you tag anyone ‘cause I hate that tactic.)

Anyway…

People have been asking about Not About Lumberjacks t-shirts and other merchandise for a while. It’s coming, but I’m not quite there yet. So, this is your chance to be one of the few people on the planet with a Not About Lumberjacks t-shirt!

Here’s how it works (and this applies internationally—none of that, “Contest valid only in the United States” stuff):

To get one entry in the random drawing, all you have to do is email me at NALStories@gmail.com and tell me your favorite episode or something you love about the show.

That’s it!

If you email me and tell me that…AND let me know you’ve shared this episode (or your fave)…or something else you love about the show online somewhere…or that you’re subscribed to my YouTube Channel, newsletter…anything like that, and you’ll get a second entry.

Finally, if you’re a Patreon patron, or sign up for my Patreon and let me know you did, you’ll get a third chance.

I’ll do the random drawing on Saturday, December 23 and contact the winner then. (And just so you know: all contact will be directly from me, so if you get contacted through an Instagram account meant to look like me, or any place other than NALStories@gmail.com, it’s not me. I only mention this because I know that even when someone tiny does some kind of a giveaway, scammers try figuring out ways to exploit it. You’ll know me by the email address and my babbling thank you for supporting the show!)

So that’s it, and again…this applies to international fans of the show, too.

All right, let’s get to work!

Old Growth

You’ve waited for over an hour for the skidder to arrive, to grab your piles of export logs and haul them off to the loaders. All the radios are silent, even when calling to other crews on the mountain.  You wonder if it’s a prank, despite your tendency toward a seriousness that instills apprehension in others from having needless fun when you’re around. You’re the one who retires early to your bunkhouse room while others stay up late in the cookhouse playing cards. You’re the one who reminds the crew to keep focus on-site, knowing that a wandering mind does not last long in the timber.

If they are up to something, you’ll make sure they regret it.

* * *

You climb out of your harvester and begin hoofing it back to the yard. Maybe it’s a problem with your radio and others are waiting for you—maybe there’s a reason the skidder didn’t return for more logs or no one has walked out to tell you something’s broken down, and that everyone gets a bit of a break on a lovely early autumn morning.

You walk along, listening to your footfalls, taking the cool air into your lungs and releasing each breath in a slow fog that lingers in the still air. Before you and to your left, all the way down the mountain, lie the efforts of your work. You tell yourself it will all one day come back, the same thing you tell yourself on every mountain you’ve helped strip bare. To your right: old growth forest that doesn’t come back the same way ever again….at least not in our lifetimes.

Not in many lifetimes.

* * *

Ahead, you spot the skidder. Its door is open, but Vinny Pastor is not inside.

“Even if there’s a break for maintenance,” you think, “he’d have at least brought everything back to the loaders.”

As you get closer, you hear it: a sound like a dog chewing on a bone. You slowly move to the far side of the vehicle, curious to see what’s between it and the trees. You step back on an angle, putting distance between you and the skidder as you poke your head around.

At first, you think it’s a wolf feeding on a recent kill, but there are no wolves in this part of the state—especially this high up in the mountains. Besides, it’s much larger than a wolf. You’ve heard that deer sometimes chew into bones for minerals, but this is too large for a deer, and elk stay down lower in the valleys.

When it stands on its hind legs and stretches to its full height, you catch a glimpse of the insides of Vinny Pastor. Ribs stick out in directions they were never intended to point—most of what’s inside is gone, dripping from the face of the creature before you. In your last effort to rationalize what you’re seeing, your think to yourself, A bear?” But as it looks at you with eyes not too unlike your own, a face more ape-like than ursine, you now understand that sometimes the things behind legends are real.

Everyone’s heard the stories and names: Bigfoot, Sasquatch, the Fouke Monster, and Skunk Ape; Yeti, Yeren, Orang Pendek, and Yowie. They have always been just that: stories, with blurry photos or footage as “proof” the legends exist. But you’ve seen no strange tracks in all your years in the mountains, and only heard stories meant to frighten green loggers coming into camp.

Now you think at least some of the shaky videos you’ve seen on television were real. As you look at a mouth slicked with the blood of a friend, you understand how fear would make it difficult to film with a steady hand. “If I’m to be next,” you think, “I’ll be the one to finally get conclusive proof.” But something so massive would be on top of you before you reached your phone in your pocket.

Running back the way you came isn’t an option. Even if you did make it back to the harvester, it would offer no shelter. The slope leading down is littered with stumps, a field of obstacles even without being pursued. A bear can run 40 miles an hour going downhill, and you imagine the hairy creature before you could likely do the same—if not move even faster.

Instead, you retreat into the forest.

* * *

As you rush through the trees, you listen behind you, surprised to hear nothing. Perhaps the creature decided a meal at its feet is better than chasing down another bite. As you stop, the only sound is your breath and the racing beat of your heart. You close your eyes and inhale deeply through your nose…out through the mouth. Repeat. When the pounding in your ears subsides, you open your eyes.

It’s darker than it should be. Not nighttime dark, but dark enough that you look to the canopy to see if storm clouds have moved in as you’ve calmed yourself. Layers of foliage high above let in just enough light to make out where you are.

You miss this kind of forest, the type of place you wandered as a child. No monoculture waiting to be harvested; instead, old growth ponderosa pines, juniper, Douglas firs, and mountain hemlock. Lichen-covered roots search for nutrients, velvet green arteries pumping life through the dirt.

You once listened to a podcast about the web of life hidden beneath forests, a network like old phone wires allowing trees to communicate. Old timber sacrificing energy to younger trees across the forest grid, giving up their life for future growth. The DNA of fish found inside inland trees, nutrients shared from tall cousins near shorelines. You remember listening and thinking, “I wish all humans were as generous.” It was one of those days you felt shame about what you do for a living.

You sit still for a minute, listening out for the creature while considering other things it might have actually been. “Would the crew have gone to such lengths for a prank?” Anything to ground yourself again in reality.

It’s only when you hear the laughing of a child that you know for certain something about this place is not right.

* * *

You consider it might be stress, or maybe the wind moving through the treetops, carrying and distorting distant sounds that resonate unlike their source upon arrival. You once visited a relative in Texas and camped beside a massive granite dome that crackled in the night as the heat of the day rose up from it like old ghosts. The wind made a bobcat’s call sound like a screaming crone by the time it wound its way through the treetops and settled into camp. It was the only time you were ever frightened while camping.

But when you hear the laughing child say your name, you know it’s not just the wind.

You run, until catching a whiff of something familiar: thick and rich tobacco. The sticky scent lingers in the humid air, reminding you of your grandfather smoking a cigar after dinner and telling you stories about logging by hand. For a time after his passing, you even tried smoking a cigar after every dinner, but it was a thing that smelled much better than it tasted—especially the morning after.

You spot the source of the smoke, a massive, hairy figure sitting on a branch in a tree that doesn’t belong here. The tree’s trunk flares at its base like thick ribbons slicing into the ground. Embers from its inhabitant’s cigar burn hot, turning into fireflies that float off into the darkness. You don’t know whether you should speak or turn back, but it doesn’t matter. Something on the path before you rises from the moss into a crooked stance and fixes its eyes upon you.

It’s much smaller than the creature at the skidder feasting on Vinny. You look for a branch or stone—anything with which to defend yourself should it charge. It opens a mouth that looks like it could stretch wide enough to swallow you whole. You realize what you thought was bristling hair covering its body is actually grass. It holds a single bronze bell in each of its hands. The melody and tone begins pulling you into its spell…

* * *

“Follow me!”

Where the trail splits, a woman stands before you, waving you her way. You pull yourself from the chiming of the bells and do as you’re told, figuring if it’s to not end well, better it be at the hands of something you can comprehend than a twisted creature with a mouth full of fangs.

When she turns, you see something move behind her: a tail. Following it up to where it connects at the bottom of her spine, you realize her back is a hollowed hole ringed with flaking bark like a dead tree. Still, you follow her over the hill.

* * *

In the grove before you, an old woman bends over a bleeding tree stump, mixing potions in a stone bowl. She adds water and sap, ground leaves and earth. Some of the concoctions are fluid and colorful, while others are viscous and brown. Salves are placed into small pots. When she’s done, she gets to work.

All the trees are bleeding, deep red sap oozing from gashes in their trunks. Some are saved, while others bleed out, shriveling tightly until shattering into piles of sawdust. The potions are for all the broken animals, beautiful, innocent beings gasping for breath all around. Like the trees, some are rescued while others perish. Beyond the marred trees and wounded animals lies a long tunnel of fire and earth scoured by man.

The old woman looks up after tending to a deer, which rises up on spry legs and leaps into the trees.

She says, “I will not claim my actions don’t matter because they do to this land and these creatures. But I can only do so much. Why must you do so much to keep me so busy?”

* * *

You turn and rush down a green trail cutting through a forest that reminds you of visiting your relatives on the East Coast. What it must have been like to arrive on those shores, seeing new land after such a long and arduous journey. It smells like those family summer trips, rich earth and distant salt and sand. You were taught this is where the nation began, until discovering there were already many nations beyond that coastline.

Before you stands a short man with hair like porcupine quills. He raises a bow and fires an arrow, hitting you in the stomach. You fall fast asleep…

* * *

You dream a myriad creation stories, lore that carried all people forward no matter where they rose. In time, tales and science collide and merge, with many finding room for only one or the other, while others make space for both. Civilizations rise and fall—some legends are lost to time, while others are carried with elders to new lands never to be forgotten. In faraway places, people come together to discover they are not so different.

You dream about the Great Turn. Smokestacks rising above forests; an insatiable desire for more. Old stories are replaced by a lust for new industry. Simple trade among small bands becomes a wicked pursuit where people cheat their neighbors. Prosperity at the suffering of others. Dwellings that once housed entire families are toppled for bigger homes inhabited by fewer people. More material is needed.

They come with axes and saws, taking entire forests instead of thanking nature for only what is needed—sacrifice for sacrifice. Soon, timber powers the machines used to take even more and start newer industries. Lumberjacks and loggers become legendary, romanticized in stories, song, film, and television. They tell tales about the forests and we tell even taller tales about them.

You learn this truth: every forest has its guardians, and you and your crew have awakened them.

* * *

You wake up on your back, staring at the canopy. Trees on all sides of you rise high, meeting above your head like a cathedral. The sky is gone, replaced by twisted branches blocking your view toward the heavens. How is it you can even see?

An old man clears his throat and, when you notice him, offers you a hand up. His other hand is a source of light, glowing with no visible means but his will. When you’re standing once again, he smiles and turns away, begins walking toward a tight tunnel of branches. The entire chamber pulses like a heart.

You remember hearing an old myth, that if one spots a perfect circle in a forest that it’s a portal to other places. An old yard boss told you, “If it’s deep in the timber, it’s always a gateway to another time or dimension, even if you don’t see it. That’s where the ancient things come and go.”

Is this the tunnel of light people who’ve crossed in death, only to return, say is the final walk we take? Your apprehension is noticed; the old man grins and turns into a raven. He flies down the tunnel lighting the way.

“Trickster,” you think, and refuse to follow.

* * *

The cathedral of branches collapses around you, snaking along the ground and grabbing you by the feet. Green tendrils shoot out from brambled walls, wrapping your arms in leaves and vines. When you try calling out, a coil of vegetation muffles you. You’re lifted from the ground, extremities pulled to their limits—Vitruvian in Green. Never one to dwell on death, you have imagined it on occasion: car wrecks, drowning while kayaking, rolling over in the harvester and tumbling down the mountain.

Pulled apart by a living forest never made the list.

“Just do it!” you try shouting despite being silenced.

What must you look like, suspended and stretched to your limits in the center of the heart of the forest?

* * *

The ground shakes, and the vines holding you taut resonate with the pain of every tree and animal taken beyond the agreement of old arrangements. How can one person endure such suffering all at once? The agony transforms you.

With each thundering wave comes the groaning and crackling of ancient hardwood pushed to its limits. You realize the wind in your face is not from some faraway place, but from the exhalation of the venerable god now standing before you.

His ancient visage commands attention, bright green eyes hold you in his gaze. A pointed nose gives way to a mustache and beard like a tangle of roots at the base of a tree. His brow rises into smaller branches, projecting a long-forgotten wisdom. His hair is moss and leaves.

“You have learned a difficult lesson today, little one.”

The vines loosen their grip.

“There is still good in you. Were there not, you would not have made it this far.”

“What do you want from me?” you say.

“I believe you know.”

“Am I supposed to apologize? I’m sorry! Is that what you want?”

“No. I want you to carry this message back to your kind. You, little one, are a problem. Your brothers and sisters, too. You have enough, but always insist on taking more. When you were new, we welcomed you as our own. You were a different kind of animal, but as much a part of The Circle as the rest of us. In time, though, your hearts filled with greed instead of wonder. It was not enough to live in harmony with the rest of us.

“There have always been thoughtful creatures among your kind, but their words have been silenced by ignorance and power. There is no shame in that, for we became silent as well. That was our undoing. It is time to make our presence known again. The Old Groves stand with the lands, seas, and the skies. Where one is harmed, we all are harmed; where one cries out in pain, so go us all. And we have grown tired of you.”

“I don’t know what you want me to do,” you say.

“That is for you to figure out. I am not here to make demands on you, but to ask you to consider your place in The Circle and what you might do to change things. Before it is too late.”

The vines holding you in the heart of the forest release their grip. Before you fall, the Old Growth God catches you in his hand and places you on the ground.

“Remember this, little one…”

* * *

As the Ancient God departs, an old woman steps out from the inside of an elder tree that shouldn’t be there. The ground is now a pond beneath your feet. You panic for a moment, expecting to fall in and be soaked, but your feet find purchase on the water’s surface. You walk to the shore, where the old woman looks at you and smiles. She reaches up and touches your cheek.

“It is not often people make it this far,” she says. “You would be amazed by how many fight back, thinking they can win a battle with nature. Here, and out there, harmony is the path to survival. In the long times, even we will be gone. Your life is not even a flash before our eyes.”

When she raises her arms, the far edge of the well-rooted grove is bathed in soft light shining through the trees. You hear the familiar grumbling of Vinny’s skidder hauling logs.

“I have set things right,” the old woman says. “Now, you must do the same.”

You step into the light.

* * *

Vinny Pastor brings the skidder to a stop and opens the door.

“You okay?”

“Yeah,” you say, even though you’re not sure.

“We were worried about you. Kept trying to call and got no response. What were you doing back there?”

“I thought I saw something in the trees.”

“Don’t know what it would have been. Sure we’ve scared almost everything off the mountain by now. Want a ride down for lunch?”

“Sure.”

Vinny rotates the seat enough for you to squeeze in and stand in the corner of the cab on the ride back to the crew.

* * *

After lunch, you say, “Do you guys ever question what we do?”

“What about it?” Nash Anderson says.

“Like this job. Should we really be cutting such old growth?”

Pam Clark takes a swig of coffee from her Thermos and says, “Hell yeah, we should! There’s a lot more money up here than down there.”

“Yeah,” you say, “but what about the future? Don’t you want your kids and grandkids to see old timber stands like these?”

Vinny says, “That’s what state and national forests are for.”

Dakota Grant winks at you and says, “You going woke on us?”

“No. I just think…”

“Think what?”

“I just think there are some places we need to leave be.”

Your boss, Colton Lewis, looks down the mountain and says, “Too late for that.”

“You sure you’re okay?” Vinny says. “You looked like you’d seen a ghost when you came out of the trees.”

“I don’t know what I saw,” you say, “but I think we need to leave.”

“Leave what?”

“The mountain.”

“Not happening,” Nash Anderson says.

“Then I need to leave…”

As you get up and walk off, Colton says, “Why don’t you just finish out your shift? Ride back to camp and sleep on it. Take a day or two and think about things.”

But you keep moving, side-stepping the stumps of ancient trees you toppled with the harvester.

“You’re serious?” Colton says. “All right—fine. We’ll pack up all your crap and mail it with your final check!”

You stop and turn back for a final look at another forest that will soon be gone. It may fall, but others still stand. As you walk down the mountain, you think about where you stand in The Circle and how you will use your voice to speak for those who cannot.

[Quirky music fades in…]

Christopher Gronlund:

Thank you for listening to Not About Lumberjacks…this episode and all the others. Hitting the 50^th full story episode knowing there are people who’ve listened to every tale makes this a joy to do. Don’t forget to check out the show notes for the giveaway rules if that sounds like your kind of thing.

Theme music, as always, is by Ergo Phizmiz. Story music was licensed through Epidemic Sound.

Sound effects are made in-house or from Epidemic Sound and freesound.org. I also got some of the woodier sounds effects in this episode from Bluezone Corporation. They have some cool stuff. Visit nolumberjacks.com for information about the show, the voice talent, and the music. Also, for as little as a dollar a month, you can support the show at patreon.com/cgronlund. And remember, if you’re a patron or you sign up, you’ll get an extra chance in the t-shirt drawing.

In December, it’s the annual Christmas episode. That means you get a handful of very short short stories, and a bigger story tied directly to the holiday season.

[Quirky music fades out…]

[The sound of an axe chopping.]

Until next time: be mighty, and keep your axes sharp!

[Listen]

[Intro music plays]

[Woman’s Voice]

This is Behind the Cut with Christopher Gronlund. The companion show to Not About Lumberjacks.

[Music fades out]

Christopher Gronlund:

Behind the Cut is an in-depth look at the latest episode of Not About Lumberjacks and likely contains spoilers of the most recent story. You’ve been warned…

* * *

There’s a line in the latest Not About Lumberjacks story, “Lakeview Estates,” that goes like this:

“Since its construction in 1961, Nate’s Corner stood at the crossroads of Kimball Avenue and Dove Road in the tiny East Texas town of Tooksberry.”

Tooksberry is entirely fictional, but anyone living in Southlake or Grapevine, Texas will know Nate’s Corner as Yate’s Corner, an actual gas station and tiny grocery store that sits at the crossroads of those streets, with Kimball establishing the border between the two towns.

Whether calling them Easter Eggs or inside jokes, Not About Lumberjacks stories are full of little things that don’t detract from the tales if you’re not aware of the reference (that would be a cruddy move on my part) but adds a little something more for those in the know.

* * *

Tooksberry, spelled T-o-o-k-s-b-e-r-r-y, is a nod to how so many places in Texas are named after other places, but often spelled or pronounced differently. And its rivalry with nearby Holstein is based on local rivalries of once rural towns now thinking they are much more than they really are.

As so many places nationwide (and even worldwide) have grown, most of us are familiar with this kind of development and the competitiveness that often comes with it.

Geographically, I used Harleton, Texas as Tooksberry’s location, even though it’s nothing like real-life Harleton. But my friend [and Monday night online gaming group rival], Jim Bearden (aka: PeePaw), grew up in Harleton—so that’s a nod to him.

And speaking of my Monday night gaming group, the protagonist of “Firing the Muse”—Warren Quinn—is a mash-up of the first names of two other friends who have killed me countless times in Among Us and destroyed me in rounds of Golf With Your Friends.

* * *

I love working little things like this into stories, but I always ensure these tiny additions never confuse those not in the know. Many of us have read a book or watched a movie where we’ve felt we’re not in on the joke. It can feel every bit as annoying as sitting with people talking about a past you’re not part of, or even going as far as deliberately telling inside jokes and stories meant to exclude you for a laugh.

Those kinds of things should always be seamless. And if it’s a joke you’re going for and not just a reference, you should always be ready to make fun of yourself.

* * *

Four years ago, when I released “Alone in HQ,” I took a poke at podcasters—some of whom are very precious about what they do. In the story, I say:

“What happens to a podcaster during the apocalypse, he wonders, when there are no more get-rich schemes to be shared, movies or television shows to review, or true crime to talk about; no more self-important hot takes on popular culture, long-winded interviews to schedule, or dude-bros who think they’re actually funny?”

Even if you’re not that familiar with podcasts, most people would assume the kinds of shows I mentioned are popular. (I know people who don’t listen to podcasts, but have asked me what kind of interviews I do or if I talk about true crime.)

It would be a low blow to tease these kinds of podcasters and leave myself out of the criticism. So…I even make fun of myself in that section with these lines:

“Employee #312566 likes to think the guy with that lumberjack show found a solar charger and still writes and records his stories. Maybe with twelve years and little else to do, if the power ever comes back, he’ll have enough of a backlog to finally release his show again on a regular schedule.”

At the time I published that story, “Alone in HQ” got bumped for more than a year by other stories I’d already written. I had one friend in particular who couldn’t wait for a post-apocalyptic story written by me, so it was my way of admitting, “Yeah, I kind of slacked on the show recently…”

* * *

At the time of this writing, I recently went to East Texas for an annual writing retreat I do with a friend. One night around the campfire, my friend Deacon mentioned Stephen King’s The Dark Tower series—how King blended characters from other stories into that, and how characters from that series are mentioned in other King books. (King’s kind of known for that.)

Nods like that to fans are a time-honored tradition for many writers. We see a character named Jenos Idanian in the I, Jedi Star Wars book. The name was used as an alias by Han Solo and adopted by another character after him. Jenos Idanian is an anagram for “Indiana Jones,” a character played by actor Harrison Ford—who was also our favorite smuggler from Star Wars: A New Hope.

C.S. Lewis wrote a poem in Through the Looking Glass in which the first letter of each line spells Alice Pleasance Liddell, the name of a child he knew. And F. Scott Fitzgerald included an epigraph in The Great Gatsby attributed to a poet he created in his earlier novel, This Side of Paradise.

It’s fun for authors to give nods to other works and for readers to dig and discuss these literary surprises.

If you miss these things, they usually affect nothing, but it you recognize them, it’s like a secret handshake or password to an elite club.

* * *

Another example from a Not About Lumberjacks story—this time, from “Gerald’s Grail.”

They spent the afternoon meandering around town, ending the day in a convenience store that had a few arcade games in the back. Gerald and Brian got excited when they saw a new cabinet next to Joust.

“What’s Tron?” Akara said.

Gerald and Brian looked each other in mock amazement before Brian said, “We really need to get you caught up on some movies you’ve missed. Trust me on this one…”

This reference to the Tron arcade game is obvious to Gen-Xers, but there’s more in that little exchange.

My dear friend, Curtis Hart, loves the movie Tron. (And he’s been a big supporter of Not About Lumberjacks from the start.) Somewhere along the way—I think in 2010—he posted something about Tron on Facebook.

My reply: “What’s Tron?”—knowing full well what it is and how much Curtis loves it.

It was one of those goofy things that caught on, to the point friends started replying to Curtis’s future posts with random images asking, “Is this Tron?”—or doing posts of their own, setting up the in-joke.

Thirteen years later, we try being a bit move covert about dropping “What’s Tron?” into things, so…slipping it into a Not About Lumberjacks story made me laugh out loud when I wrote it, and I would have loved seeing Curtis’s face as he listened.

But as goofy as forcing it into a story was, it does serve a purpose. The character asking “What’s Tron?” is a Cambodian refugee. Growing up, I had friends with parents and grandparents from Mexico, but no friends born in other countries until the later 70s and early 80s, when people from Vietnam and Cambodia moved to my hometown. Things my friends and I took for granted were unknown and even challenged by our new friends who lived lives we couldn’t fathom.

Akara Mok is a nod to those old friends and the things I learned about the world from them.

We couldn’t believe they weren’t aware of some pop culture reference that was second nature to us, and they couldn’t believe we assumed they’d know, given how different their lives were from ours up until that point.

* * *

There’s one final inside joke right up front in the latest Not About Lumberjacks story—the name.

I live in an area that was once a bit rural, despite being adjacent to more populated spaces. Today, the area is not only developed, but near some of the wealthiest towns in Texas. Where an outlaw biker club was in the 1980s is now a suburban ranch (likely for the tax breaks). Where a cult compound stood is now office space. And multi-million-dollar homes stand on sites where tiny homes once dotted the land.

In high school, I worked as a dishwasher and busboy at a restaurant called The Catfish Hut. At a bend in the road on the final approach to that slog-of-a-weekend-job was a trailer park called Lakeview Estates.

Today, it’s the site of million-dollar homes in a housing development called—you guessed it—Lakeview Estates.

To this day, that’s one of my favorite inside jokes…

* * *

Thank you for listening to Not About Lumberjacks and Behind the Cut. Theme music for Behind the Cut is a tune called “Reaper” by Razen. Visit nolumberjacks.com for information about the music, the episodes, and voice talent.

Also, for as little as a dollar a month, you can have access to a bigger behind-the-scenes look at Not About Lumberjacks on Patreon. Check out patreon.com/cgronlund if that sounds like your kinda thing.

In November, it’s not only the annual anniversary episode, but the 50^th story episode of the show! So, what’s in store for the most NOT Not About Lumberjacks story of the year? How about this:

The first second-person story I think I’ve ever written in which YOU are a lumberjack…

Until next time: be mighty, and keep your axes sharp!