Normally I wouldn’t do two entries in one day but what an adventure we just had! I had to get sand for the Circle. I calculated I would need about five yards of sand at $30/yard.
Here are MY calculations: if it’s 15 feet across, the math is: 15'x15'=225 sf x 3" deep (or .25 foot)=56.25 cubic feet/9 (9 feet/cubic yard)=6.25 cubic yards
If it’s 13 feet across, it’s 13'x13'=169 sf x 3" (.25 foot) =42.25 cubic feet/9 (9 cubic feet/yard)=4.7 cubic yards
(I know I’m using the area of a square and not a circle, but it’s not really either shape and it’s uneven ground.)
So last night I asked Dad if he could bring over some buckets in his pickup and we’d go fill the buckets with sand and bring them home. (The sand place is only a couple of miles away, if that.) I called him at 9:30 and he said he’d come over when he finished his cereal. I went outside and finished stapling the plastic weed barrier and found some more buckets and bungee cords and moved my Pathfinder to the street. It was NOT RAINING.
Dad came over a little past ten, it was just starting to rain. We drove the short distance to the quarry, and it’s really raining. We grabbed shovels and started filling our 13 buckets. By now it’s full-fledged POURING (thanks Charlie), we’re in mud up to our ankles, soaked to the skin. It seemed like an awful lot of sand so I went inside to ask the lady how much of a yard was in each bucket. She said a yard would FILL the back of the pickup. So I would need to fill the pickup bed FIVE times. She tried to convince me to just have them deliver it (the logical solution, of course, if I had money) rather than fill 135 buckets. (Or ten trips like we were making.) I asked them to figure it out and they said I only need TWO yards of sand, not five. And guess how much our 13 buckets of sand ended up costing? (I had the full $125 with me for five yards).
ELEVEN DOLLARS.
Now of course Dad was worried that the buckets will shift and break the tailgate. (That’s why I brought bungies). So in the pouring rain I was bungeeing (is that a word?) all these buckets into the bed of the pickup. We had to go up and down a small hill and my father was freaking out that the buckets would shift, break the tailgate, spill sand everywhere and we’d get arrested. (You wondered where my fertile imagination and talent for drama came from? Now you know.) Of course this did not happen.
We unloaded the buckets into the driveway. My original plan had been to spread the sand immediately and see how much more I’d need. Nope, not in this rain. The buckets are just sitting there absorbing water and getting heavier. I tried to offer my dad lunch but he said no as it was almost 11:30 and we’d have to change clothes and shower and it would be too late.
When I got inside, I was soaked to the skin. It was like being in Herkimer NY digging for quartz, except it was sand today and muddy red clay in New York.
I feel really, really bad about making my dad help me in the pouring rain. He's not the type to ever complain or say "I don't want to do this, let's do it another day" (which any intelligent person, like my husband, would have said). I just wanted to get the sand and get it over with so I can go onto the next phase of the Circle-building: making more poetry stones.
I wanted to go see about a job later on today but I’m filthy and wet and not sure I’m in the mood. But I guess I should; I need work, and it’s an “apply in person” position. (614)
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