I have a saw.  My hand fits nicely into its lovely wooden grip from where the metal blade shines, 25cm long, rectangular and straight-bladed down to the wicked looking serrated edge. But it is worse than useless.  It is in my toolbox giving me the illusion that it can cut wood, giving me the illusion of power over incorrectly shaped planks.  Useless is a neutral word, a word that places usefulness in front of me and simply removes it leaving me without the use of the object.  Use-Less.  But this saw is evil, beyond mere negativity.

Last week we had cleared the weeds off the lowest of the four terraced plots on the allotment that we share with some friends, and this week we took along long planks, a lump hammer, the saw, wooden and metal stakes.  We were going to edge the terraced bed and I was ready, I had even remembered my leather gloves.  My friend’s plank needed to be sawed to fit and he said “I should have brought a saw” and I waggled my implement, gleefully.  We drew a guide-line, I stood on the back to stabilise and he commenced sawing.  To discover that the saw was blunt.

As we proceeded the blade heated up and bent, it squeaked in protest and much later, after 10 minutes and 3cm I took a turn, I could not move the blade in the slot that he had carved, I absolutely could not.  He took over for a while.  There was still 15 cm to go when he put the job down, drove to his house and fetched one of those plastic handed saws that some people make music on and within minutes the job was done.