Back To Reality

In the movie Doctor Zhivago, Yuri and Lara visit a house in the frozen tundra of Russia, white with ice, it is an ethereal moment in the movie, and the house is a ghostly white winter wonderland. I can relate to that scene except the temperature was 100 degrees and it was not ice, it was dust. While Ty, Adie and I frolicked in the aqua waves of the Caribbean, our house was being picked apart with a hammer and chisel leaving behind a fine white powder that crept its way into every tiny crack and crevice and coated every surface inside and out.

The overhang attached to the house, where the new porch will be had to be removed leaving a jagged scar on the walls, exposing the mamposteria (stacked stone). After four hours of mopping, wiping, mopping a second time and washing every dish, our dust covered abode was again inhabitable. We fall into our chairs, exhausted, open a cold one, and have a good laugh.

Debris from “The Dig” is carefully screened for valuable dirt, the remaining rock shoveled into buckets and dumped on the ever-increasing mounds in the back of the yard.

With anticipation, we stand gazing into the hole and watch as Jose places the first stone to create the mamposteria wall of the swimming pool. Julio and Jose work hard, taking great care in selecting and placing each stone.

The columns arrive and are neatly stacked in the corner awaiting their installation. Four-foot holes are dug near the foundation of the house to check the stability of the walls then once it is determined the foundation is sound they are filled in and yet more deep holes are dug for the footings of the columns.

Handmade rebar towers are placed into the deep holes and filled with rock and cement.

                              Before long, we have the footprint of our swimming pool.

                                     By the way, today is Adies birthday. She's four.