Cans and Spring Cleaning

www.AnneAppleman.com 

I have this situation with my garbage can area.  We keep the cans by the back door,  for easy access.   The previous homeowners had put down slate secured in concrete and kept the cans on top of that.  I thought the concrete was ugly.  But I liked the slate.  I would free the slate by breaking up the concrete.  I kinda did that.  Kinda.  The job became a little much.  (All of my jobs are becoming a little much.) So I freed most of the slate, laid them back down in the dirt.  Then it was like putting together a puzzle and I hate puzzles so I tossed whatever I could down to make it somewhat level,  left a couple chunks still in the concrete and abandoned Project GC (Garbage Can.)

That was last year.

Spring has sprung! I got to cleaning up in the backyard and yet again returned to Project GC.  No better than how I had left it.  Now with a winter passed-  to my credit, (swipe tongue over lower teeth, pop suspenders) it has shaped up to be one helluvan eye-sore.

Last week, I put a square block of slate on top of the whole thing, ignoring the particular angles that shaped the perimeters, so it bled on and over the bricks.  It looked better, I convinced myself.  I went on with my life.

This morning I saw it for what it was.  A ridiculous aching mess trying to be an organized space.  (Is anyone drawing an analogy yet? This is profound, this is how we treat and create all of the eye-sores in our lives.) Looking at the square, I thought, "Now why did I put this here?" It makes no sense -still- I didn't want to pick it up.  It's heavy as a horse and dirty and wasn't I done with this already?! Didn't I solve this last weekend? When I put the fucker down in the first place? Well,  apparently not, because here I am, still giving Project GC the hairy eyeball.  Still mad at it.  I could leave it, turn my eye to focus on something else.  I don't want to do anything.  But I'll be back.  So I say to myself  "Self, now's as good a time as any."  So, I lift up the big slab and see the pretty slate in the ugly concrete that I never dealt with back when.  Plus, the mess now with leaves and other fall/winter crud underneath that.  "Ah, good over bad." That's what made me do that.  I thought I'd take some good and put it over the bad,  sounds about right.  It did look better, but it still looked horrible.

I realized.  Unless I take out everything and level the bottom and work with the slate to form the puzzle  or replace the whole thing altogether...it's always going to bother me.  Just like everything else.  Unless I clear it out from the foundation, it's never right.  That's a lot of work. WORK! The worst four letter word of them all.

This is the place in popular blogs where they ask leading questions like "What garbage are you dealing with today?" Here's my attempt-"Do you have anything that looks like dirty piles of crud instead of the good thing you aimed to create?" "Something that you wouldn't even want to show a picture of?" "Do you need to clean up your can area?"

* I love the word "cans".  "Can" alone is alright, but plural makes me laugh till I fart.  "Is there anything in your life that makes you laugh till you fart?"

Have a great week! Happy Easter and Passover and Spring Cleaning!