Finding Beauty

Things are popping in the yard right now.  The Man is scurrying around spreading mulch, tilling and laying down manure in the garden, sowing seeds. Watering seedlings. 

Putting in the peas.

And putting them in again because they weren't in a straight line the first time.

Good gravy. He is a bit preoccupied with the garden.

~~~~~~~~~~

He also had to do something about

that

outhouse.

He started building the outhouse to replace one that got destroyed a couple winters ago during a horrible blizzard. The Man's grandfather passed down a fishing cabin a short distance away. It is very rustic, almost prehistoric. It has a hand pump for water in the kitchen. And a big cast iron stove. And it had an outhouse. No one used it. It was more of a storage shed for magazines and paper goods.

But the blizzard took it away and the Man wanted it back. So he decided to build a new one. 

IN OUR BACKYARD.

~~~~~~~~~~

Let me use these words : HORRIBLE IDEA.

This thing has been gracing the backyard all winter. I see it when I come home from work. I see it when I come home from running errands. I see it whenever I drive up the road. And so does everyone around us.

I do not want it in my backyard. I do not want it in the front yard. Or the side yard.

I do not want it here or there. I do not want it anywhere.

I want it gone.

The breaking point came last week. 

I was sitting in knitting class and P, the instructor, leaned over and said to me, "Your neighbors want to know why you have an outhouse in the backyard."

That. Is. It.

The outhouse has to go.

At dinner the following evening, I told the Man and Mom we were the topic of the neighborhood because of that outhouse.

Mom got indignant and thought we should leave it there. She said,  If we want an outhouse in the back yard, who's going to stop us?

Feisty is that one.

Then she tells us that she went inside it the other day when she was cleaning out some flower beds. Just to see what it looked like.

Good grief. Someone might have seen her coming out and thought she just finished using it. I said that to her. She laughed. And then she tilted her head, You know, it might be handy to have it out there for when you can't make it into the house in time.

Gulp. I have got to get rid of this thing or it may end up a permanent fixture back there.

~~~~~~~~~~

Last weekend I put my foot down, That outhouse has to go!

The Man, and J, and K, and I pushed and pulled and tipped and tilted. We leaned and grunted and screeched and shouted.

All to no avail. We need men. Big, strong, strapping men to come and lift this thing onto the truck to be taken away.

So it is still there. But now it is on its side, resting on a couple sawhorses, pushed up against the barn. You can only see the bottom of it from the road. I am not happy that it is still there but I am happy that it does not look like an outhouse.

All these lovely flowers help to distract me from 

that

outhouse.

Finding the beauty that surrounds me.