I‘m considering going back for that stone. It’ll take the better part of a day to haul through those woods, but I want it as the centerpiece for the wood storage structure I’ll be building across the coming weeks. Looking at that image now though, I suspect it might be a bit too big. 

I moved a lot of rock today. I got a great big one that I had to revisit about five times across the span of the day, between meetings and work. I’d carry it maybe 100ft, then need to retreat home to catch my breath and flee the mosquitoes. 

I got it from the nearest brook and up the steepest part of the land. I fell several times. It was hard to carry because it was heavy enough that I had to press it against my chest, and the pressure required to keep it from falling was enough to make it hard to breath.

It fit my aspiration of: a stone that you can just barely lift. That’s always my goal, to find a stone I can barely lift at all, and carry it up the hill, no matter how long it takes. Today it took the better part of an intermittent day. 

We had our first bout at around 9am when I walked the dogs. I got it out of the river. I worked then for a few hours and went back to haul it up the hill a ways on a break, back to meetings, then another haul. I got it to the threshold at around 4 pm. It is what I did between writing and emails and meetings. I think that’s a good thing. 

It left marks on my arms and my legs and smeared dirt across my throat and my face. I washed myself before getting on zoom.