It was late in the fall, and Joshua and I were out cutting firewood for our outdoor wood furnace. We use our furnace to heat our home along with the hot water for our home and our milkhouse. We use a lot of hot water to wash our milking system twice a day, along with our milk tank every other day. We also use hot water in our cattle tanks outside when it’s bitter cold, so they don’t freeze up. To do all this, we have to cut a lot of firewood, which we gladly do. It’s hard work, but we don’t mind, for it saves a lot on the energy bill. It’s also very nice coming into a cozy, warm house in the middle of the winter when the chores are all done.

We are blessed to have a big woods, which we cut a lot of dead and downed trees out of. We oftentimes make twisting, winding trails to get to them. So on this particular day, we were deep into our woods by the time we had gotten our dump box loaded, heaping full of firewood. With the load super full (Joshua always likes to heap it up just as full as he can possibly get it), he then drove it out of the woods.

Everything had gone just fine, and it was time to head home for the evening chores. But I had a problem. I had just cut a large, dead ash tree, and as it fell, it got hung up in some other trees. I called out to Joshua to drive the tractor back into the woods so that we could hook a log chain onto the front of the tractor to pull the tree down. The tree didn’t pull easily, but I got it pulled safely down with the loaded box still hooked onto the back of the tractor.

Now we had to back the tractor out of the woods with the loaded dump box behind it. I could see it was going to be difficult to back it down the twisting trail with big trees and brush on both sides of it, so I asked Joshua, “Would you like me to back it out for you?” I’ve backed it out for him many times in the past in difficult situations. He replied, “I think I can get it.” I was surprised; I knew it wasn’t going to be easy, but I didn’t say anymore. I know you’ve got to give people a chance to do more difficult things if they are going to grow and become more successful. I was a ways off as he was backing it out; I could see he was cutting it real close to one side of the trail next to a brush pile, but I still didn’t say anything.

One of the tires on the dump box caught a stick that was sticking out of the brush pile and poked a large hole into the sidewall.

I walked up to Joshua and said, “Didn’t you see that brush pile there?”

“No,” he answered. “I was watching the other side.”  

I replied, “You have to watch both sides.”

We came home with the pickup, got a different wheel and some tools, and went back down and changed the wheel. Then he finished backing it out of the woods and brought it home. Because of it, the cows were one hour late getting milked that night.  

The next day, Joshua offered to pay for the replacement tire, but I told him, “No.” I said, “It could have happened to me too. Besides that, that tire’s sidewall was getting pretty rotten; I’m surprised it went this long. If it would have been a newer tire, I think it wouldn’t have blown out.” Joshua agreed with that.

“It could have happened to me too.” We all make errors and mistakes, so we had better not be hard on others when they make mistakes. A person should grow by the mistakes they make; I know I sure have. I’ve made plenty of them, and I’ve grown a lot by them. You are to teach your children correctly and then give them a chance to fail if they’re going to succeed. That’s one of the best ways to grow.

Joshua drives a load of firewood. Image provided by Tom Heck.