Relative Something

My mind continues to linger on the shade sail project even though our contractor, Justin, won’t be available to do the post-installation until 10 days from today. I’d like to do as much preparation as possible before his hourly rate kicks in, so I decided to work on the leaning fence line yesterday.

The first thing I did was tie a guide string that indicates the straight line originally established for that length of fence. Then, I stood and stared at it for a long time, wondering how to go about the multiple steps that would be required.

• I knew I would be unscrewing horizontal boards from the posts.
• I wasn’t sure how to manage the pending curiosity from the horses.
• I was hoping to pull the uphill post that will end up being replaced by the new shade sail post.
• The other post to be replaced has a gate attached to it.
• Where do I put the gate when it has been removed?
• Can I temporarily put fence webbing to keep horses from trying to cross there?
• Maybe I could pull the other posts upright before pulling the gate post.

I opted for pulling the first post because that seemed the most straightforward. The only way I could imagine successfully extracting that post and persuading the rest of them to stand back up straight was to use the diesel tractor.

After wrapping a chain around the hook on the loader bucket and then the post to be pulled, the slight touch of the lever lifted that post flawlessly. That’s the way I wish all things worked.

Next, I moved the tractor back and wrapped a tie-down strap around the next post over to apply pressure against the weight of the tractor. I’m sure the come-along would have been the more appropriate choice, but it was up in the shop garage, and the strap was right there to grab. I’d already made more trips back and forth to get one more thing than my sanity in the moment wanted to tolerate.

I was able to bring the post in line and only lost a little of the upright level when releasing the pressure. Looked straight enough to the naked eye. Moving to one of the two most tipped posts, which happen to be on either side of the waterer, I repeated the routine with the strap.

That post offered much more resistance than the first one. I’m going to need to do a lot more digging in order to gain the inches needed to get it in line again.

It was getting close to feeding time for the horses, and I wanted to get everything put away before starting that process. That meant repeating the routine of trips back and forth to carry all the stuff I had brought out throughout the hours of trying one thing after another to achieve my goal.

I made enough progress in the end to feel successful about my efforts, although I didn’t realign as many posts as I hoped. Luckily, I have plenty more days to fiddle around with this before the sail frame installation officially gets underway.

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