I had viewed trail maintenance as a necessary evil. It's lousy work, but someone has to do it, summed up my view before I got involved. I was pleasantly surprised when I began to look forward to trail maintenance trips. They weren't bad tasting medicine that had to choked down for the good of the trail. They were the spoonful of sugar.
All hikers owe it to themselves to get out and work on trails.
It won't just broaden your appreciation for the places you hike, it may add to the ways you enjoy trails. It is what a man thinks about while chopping or about to chop. They will not only value your input, but they will appreciate the advice all the more when you show up on a worktrip to correct the problem. I think that the important opinions about trail maintenance are not written with a pen, but with the pulaski, saw, and lopping shears. And that is as it should be.