FIRMLY PLANTED â—½ ENCOURAGEMENT
One Thing Leads to Another
by Dina Cavazos
Somewhere around eleven years ago, near the beginning of my prayer garden adventure, I made a granite path from each side of the front of the house all the way around to the back. It’s almost a full circle (more oval, really) around the house. It’s lined with beds of plants, except for the right side, which is where I store my supplies.
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It was quite a lot of work, but it was fulfilling and enjoyable, with God speaking to me along the way (see past article Living Stones in the 2016 archives). I started it myself, laying the stone borders and landscape fabric, hauling load after load of decomposed granite, then spreading, raking, and tamping. Starting from the front walkway, I went across, then around the left side of the house to the back gate. On the advice of a landscape designer, 3-4 feet wide—not a narrow path. A wide path allows for the overgrowth of plants, which can completely obstruct a narrow one as they grow, which I’ve found out to be true. I also laid the path on the right side of the house.
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When it came to the back—from side gate to the other side gate—let’s say I was older and wiser and realized help would be helpful. I found someone who laid a steel border and made the path, which is quite large, for a very reasonable price.
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​After a few years, I was given some small granite stone which I made the mistake of adding to parts of the path. Don’t do this! When raking the path,
the larger rocks are raked up with acorns and larger debris, so you either have to separate them somehow or just throw them in the bin with the debris. “One-half minus” decomposed granite is the standard (which I used originally) and that’s the best, at least for a yard like mine that drops acorns and twigs.
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After eleven years, the rain had washed away some of the smaller particles, leaving bare spots and bigger stones. Finally, with cooler weather at hand, it was time to resurface the path, and it just so happened my sixteen-year-old grandson needed to earn some money. This time I had a delivery truck dump four yards of ½ minus on my driveway and hired my grandson and his two cousins to do the work. I helped a little for the fun of it.
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And what fun we had! They worked for five hours, with short breaks and a hotdog lunch. They listened to Christmas music and sang and danced as they shoveled. They shouted out lines from the movie Holes: “I’m tired of digging, Grandpa!” and then answering, “Well that’s too dang bad, keep digging!” It filled my heart with joy to watch them, and it was worth every penny of their generous wage. After they dumped wheelbarrows full of granite all around and raked it smooth, they put away tools and it was time to go.
They did the heavy lifting, but I still have work to do. I overestimated the amount of granite I needed, so there’s a pile in the driveway. The path needs to be watered down and tamped and I’ll use some of the granite to fill low spots as it’s tamped down. One thing leads to another: as I’m doing this, I see that much of the rock edging has sunk down and is buried. In preparation for resurfacing, I had raked up much of the larger stones. Now I’m using them as a base underneath the stones as I dig them up and bring the border to its original height.
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​As I work, I think...This will most likely be the last time I do this. In another 11 years I’ll be an octogenarian. Mixed emotions stir my heart: amazement, surprise, gratefulness, nostalgia, joy and sorrow. Past, present, and future meld together as I face the reality of aging and uncertainty. I don’t know how things will be in another 10 years, in my world and the world at large, but I’m confident I need not worry because the One and Only Creator
acts in Love in every Time and Circumstance, though human eye may not see or understand.
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In the meantime, I’ll do what I love to do as long as I’m able—like the natural stone mosaic I’m now working on (which I’ll tell you about next month!)—because one thing leads to another.