Going Crazy in Park Hill
The other day found me engaged in my daily ritual of lawn contemplation. I was of course focused on this year’s pattern of bald spots. A man should be able to handle his own lawn, darn it!
The words of our 16th President came to mind “Most folks are as happy as they make up their minds to be.” I reflected on how true that was and in a flash I altered it to “You’re about as crazy as you want to make yourself!”
I considered this as my eyes fed data to somewhere in my brain concerning the bumper crop of bindweed it was recording.
Having grown up in the Midwest, most summers were devoted to keeping the lawns in check … not of dragging them into existence and then providing ongoing life support.
Could it be that I was getting obsessive? Probably, OK, certainly. But in Park Hill what threats could there be that would pose a threat to one’s sanity? It is after all a very nice and sought after neighborhood. Surprisingly, several candidates came immediately to mind.
The threats were of three kinds: those presented by nature, those created by urban civilization and those invented by us, men and women.
The terrors of nature include bugs that eat your prized plants and never even consider touching your dandelions, nearly every aspect of gardening, squirrels and assorted varmints that eat and gnaw things you rather they didn’t, and big old beautiful trees that have to go.
Civilization’s challenges include potholes along most of your essential routes and make one wonder if some sort of spoils system is working overtime behind the scenes to thwart the paving of your street, Colorado Boulevard traffic … when will we reach the new normal here? Also, how long should I plan to get to Colorado and Interstate 25? Why is recycling pickup day the same as street sweeping ticket day? And, don’t roll through stop signs, especially on 26th Avenue.
Now for the real doozies. What we (I) make up about how things should be. Little rules about who should park in front of whose home. Should your guest park in the shady part in front of my house? Is it OK to have a dandelion farm and distribution center in my front yard? Barking dogs and refuse clean up. Leash laws are mandatory unless you are special and have a well-trained dog – then you are entitled to ignore it.
These stresses can bring out the crazy in us all, but for me the most recent bit of lunacy involves the having and maintaining of the backyard “water feature.”
This particular fountain was such a bargain, especially when measured against the price of potatoes. I think we paid $150 for it at 50 cents per pound. This concrete tank obstacle, which would look at home on the Maginot Line, resembles a cross between an Aztec Pyramid and the Washington Monument, complete with reflecting pool, like something Nikita Khrushchev would have in his Kremlin garden.
Sporting a jaunty Soviet grey color scheme and an art deco square shape, it is topped off by a concrete, porkpie hat. It’s heavy enough to give one cause for sober reflection and perhaps a silent prayer, prior to lifting. Imagine one of those Olympic weight lifters chalking up before their squat. Once wrestled into place with the petulant assistance of ramps, pulleys and conscript labor, which would do a Pharaoh proud, it does produce a surprisingly pleasant and melodious gurgling. It constitutes the centerpiece of our garden retreat.
Besides the usual travails of dead leaves clogging the capricious pump, aging tubing and quixotic wiring, we soldiered on for the last six years. But last fall Mother Nature dealt us a crippling blow with the early hard freeze. With an icy ease the water collecting tank was not just cracked but split clean through, producing a 300-pound tombstone. Patching, caulking and swearing gave rise to a hope for a solution. All those having failed, they can now be eliminated as potential fixes … although I haven’t quit given up on the swearing bit.
My last attempt at caulking can be summed up in my beloved’s question of, why is the water in the fountain so milky? I guess I hadn’t let the caulk cure for long enough in the spring’s wet weather.
As my deadline for this article passes, we have yet to bring down the curtain on our water feature drama. I’ll be back at it this weekend. In the meantime, stay sane.
Neil Funsch has been a mortgage broker for 18 years, the last five in Park Hill. He can be reached at 303-229-2684 or neil.funsch@gmail.com.