A few days ago I wrote about gleaning for your home and family, saving money when it's handed to you on a stainless steel platter. We've been enjoying the opportunity to collect the rounds of firewood the department of transportation is piling along the new highway cut near our house. Since we don't have a truck, being able to make a couple trips out there after dinner or before breakfast - when the road crews aren't working - has been a plus.

We don't gather the wood because we're cheap or because we're broke. Partly, it's fun for former city girls to get into the small town, semi-rural rhythm of chopping wood and hauling water. (Yes, in a desert, we often bucket water our trees and flowers, catching rain runoff or at least reducing hose evaporation.) Partly, it's good exercise. Mostly, at $225 a cord, it just makes sense to pick it up when it's practically handed to you for free.

The rack in the back of the picture (hand built from scrap) holds about 2/3 cord. This photo includes last night's haul, and there's more to be had.

Several cars slowed down as they passed me at dusk muscling part of what you see here into my trunk and tarp-covered passenger seat. It was quite different the first Saturday morning we went out a few months back. We were first on the scene, and spoke to the "dirt captain" who shared the safety rules of harvesting what the crews dozed and cut so it could be hauled away. As other folks drove up with their shiny pickup trucks, we freely passed the word. When we had to bring our little Jeep home to empty it, one of the men we'd talked to took over our pile of juniper leaving us the pine. I was disappointed, but in the long run, it hasn't mattered much.

The novelty of the free firewood soon wore off. Seldom have we passed a pile in the last couple months that wasn't still there when we got around to getting it, or was ultimately chipped by the road crew.

Even a neighbor of ours, with a Ford F250 and a trailer, would not go out with us when we offered to load and unload for him and his family on splits. He was too busy resting up from being out of work, I guess.

What am I getting to? That in gathering wood, picking apples, paying off your mortgage early, and hundreds of other life pursuits, persistence pays big time! Did you know only about a quarter of the people who start college finish it? In the arts - music, theatre, movies, television, authoring - only about 1-2% of the people in each profession make it big? Up to 3% do pretty well. I guess everyone else would rather watch sports. It's the same in the professions: educator, lawyer, doctor, minister, financial consultant, computer programmer. The gap between the top couple percent and everyone else is huge.

Don't be discouraged putting $5 additional principal on your mortgage each month, or $5 in savings. Drop your change in a dish and  do something important with it every month or two. It isn't how big the thing you're doing is, it's how long after everyone else has stopped that often makes the difference in winning or just playing. I've heard an Olympic athlete say, "Practicing 15 minutes after everyone else knocks off made all the difference."

It isn't the money you have or the talent you were born with that determines who you are and what you're made of. Ultimately, it's all up to you. Get in the game and don't get out until you hear a thundering voice from heaven saying, "No, over there!"