Men And Their Chainsaws...Part IV

...and he took the chainsaw with him. Dad never really used the saw that much in his first couple of years in Georgia; there really hadn't been a need for it. That is, until the late winter blizzard hit in 1988. It was like a northern snowstorm, almost 21 inches of snow fell in North Georgia. And to make matters worse, it started to thaw quickly and then froze again, and then everything was covered in a sheet of ice. That's when limbs started cracking, and branches started snapping, and before you knew it, any tree that was within 15 feet of a power line toppled to the ground. No lights. No furnace. No stove. No nothing. It didn't take long once things had settled down before the locals started to work on all of those fallen trees. Dad had gotten the old yellow chainsaw out of the storage building and it cranked on the first try. Dad was able to cut his way down the driveway and cut the limbs away from the power lines so the electric company could begin to restore the power to the area. The saw was now over 14 years old and it worked like a top. After that, I'm not really sure what happened to the saw, it just faded from memory. Until a few weeks ago. Mom had been having a yard sale and was cleaning out the shed when she came across a familiar object. It was the old saw and it seemed in pretty good condition, so she put it in the yard sale to sell. It was late on Saturday evening and we had begun to put the things away that hadn't sold. An older gentleman in a beat up Chevy pickup pulled up in the driveway and asked if he could look around. We said sure and stopped what we were doing and watched the old guy browse what we still had left out. I didn't think he was interested in anything until he noticed the yellow chainsaw. My goodness...his eyes lit up, he picked up the saw, turned it this way and turned it that way. "Whatcha' want for this old saw?" he asked. "I had one just like it for over 35 years and it just cut out on me recently. It was the best dang saw I ever had." I looked over at Mom not exactly sure what she was going to say. "My husband loved that saw, we got that for him on Father's Day back in '74. I'll tell you what, since it's so close to Father's Day, I'll let you have it for free on one condition." "What's that?" he asked. "Use it," Mom said. "Yes, Ma'am," he said. And with that he pulled his hat down low over his eyes, lit himself a cigarette, and gave that cord a yank... Happy Father's Day!