I had just watched a DIY show and saw how easy it was to construct a simple fountain over the course of a single weekend.
I bought the supplies and got to work.
The weekend came to an end but my project had not.
My project, in fact, never truly progressed successfully beyond Step One, which was the digging of a hole into which to place the basin. No matter my various efforts and attempts, I had been unable to get the bottom of the hole level and, therefore, when the preformed liner was placed inside it was ever at an obvious tilt.
The next weekend came around and I decided that building a box into which I could place the liner would solve the problem. I had no idea how to build a box as that step had not been covered by HGTV’s perky DIY contractor, Amy Matthews. She had simply shoveled a hole, tossed the liner into it, filled it with water and, via the magic of television with its spliced footage and very Non-DIY contractors who don’t make appearances in the segment, had a perfectly level basin from which water bubbled beautifully from the center.
I nailed some plywood pieces together with paneling nails, as every other size seemed to split the layered boards. I now know that a frame of some sort, onto which the plywood could have been attached, should have been built but I was already going well above and beyond what Ms. Matthews, who never even had to remove her hammer from the tool belt around her waist, had said was necessary.
The basin box, which I am sure would have lasted no longer than a month beneath the soil’s surface had my project endured for even that long, did hold the liner quite nicely but, not surprisingly, the entire box, with the perfectly held liner sat in the hole at a perfect slant.
It then occurred to me that some folks use concrete to level a foundation.
On week three of this project that anyone could complete in a weekend, according to the ever smiling Amy Matthews, who didn’t even dirty her gloves during the construction of her fountain, I bought several bags of quick-crete. I opted for the fast, post setting type because three weeks into a weekend project, I simply did not have the time nor the patience to wait any longer.
I donned my gardening gloves and began stirring the concrete by hand. By hand, I do not mean without the aid of a power auger of some sort but, rather, I mean I stuck my hand into the hole filled with bags of powder and enough water to make it soupy and began to churn the mix.
As it dried, I removed the gloves, which, being cloth gardening gloves rather than impermeable plastic, had allowed much of the concrete mix to seep inside and to settle in the finger tips. My fingers were wet, shriveled and burned so I opted to forego the gloves altogether as I smoothed the concrete bare handed and then heaped it onto the sides of the hole’s dirt walls where it refused to stay, thus requiring me to scoop and reapply for more than an hour.
By day’s end, my fingers could touch nothing due to excruciating pain. So agonizing was it for anything to even brush the surface of my fingers that I propped a pillow on either side of me in the bed that night and used them to support my arms as I slept on my back with my elbows bent and forearms and fingers pointed upwards.
The following day, the skin began to peel away and soon my fingertips were nothing more than raw hunks of flesh. So damaged were they that my fingerprints no longer worked on my automated id and I had to scan a card for the next several months until new fingerprints had formed sufficiently for a new scan to be taken.
Unfortunately, the concrete, while very effective at rendering a person able to commit a crime without being identified by any fingerprints left at the scene, was not the answer for a level foundation- at least not by the methods which I had employed.
On week five of the weekend long project, having skipped week four due to not being able to grip anything with my damaged hands, I simply added dirt around the unlevel edge of the basin, which barely poked above the ground’s surface, filled it with water, added a tray to hold rocks above the pump, stuck in the filter and the fountain head and declared the project, at long last, “done”.
My efforts required more than a month rather than a weekend but the result was, truly, quite spectacular to behold. Birds and squirrels regularly drank from my little fountain and I was quite proud of it- for almost an entire week.
Much closer to the weekend time frame than was the building of the water fount, was the ruin of the water fount.
The shallow water above the rock level was no match for the Florida sun and algae set in. In only days, every rock was green, the surface was covered in slime and the pump became clogged. By week’s end, the birds and squirrels, when they came, only peered in with disgust before scampering off to far less greener pastures, or water sources, as it were.
What I had hoped would give us an opportunity to watch wildlife from the kitchen window did, in fact, harbor and provide sanctuary for no form of animal life other than the mosquitoes which quickly made themselves right at home.
I tore the basin from the ground, removed the liner from the already dilapidated box and shoveled dirt over the flesh eating-crete in the bottom of the stupid hole.
I pledged to avoid Ms. Matthews and her “can do” spirit and have remained true to my boycott of that nasty lady who dared to make me believe, against my better judgement, that I could actually accomplish a DIY project.
The liner sat behind the house mocking me for a full year until last May when I decided to give a traditional, small pond a try. With the water a bit deeper and with the location adjusted to a more shady area behind the house, the green scum, perhaps, would not bring all my best efforts to naught.
I dug a hole, built a box, which included a frame, put in the liner and had my pond.
It was, of course, altogether unleveled but I was absolutely okay with that fact as I had learned the previous year that there is absolutely no way that is humanly possible by which a box in the ground can possibly be leveled. Once my efforts were completed, I also readily accepted the fact that I had dug the hole at an angle that did not align at all as it should have and thus made my little pond look crooked. I was, though, sure that I was just being overly self-critical and that fact would go unnoticed by anyone else.
I then began building a small deck around the little 4X2X1 water trough. Having only a hand saw, I passed over those sturdy but hard to cut 2X4s in favor of the much more easily hewn 1X4s.
With a half circle design theme in mind, I cut and assembled wide areas of wood on either side of the rectangular pool with a small top and bottom piece around the rest of the water trough’s perimeter.
As it turns out, wood that is only 1” thick and nailed over support beams set at rather wide berths is not particularly capable of supporting the weight of anyone beyond the age of a toddler. Who knew?!
I had no intentions of redoing my efforts, however, so determined that a strict “Do Not Walk on the Deck” policy would be put into place.
Jo-Ann took one look at my finished work and declared that she had no desire to walk on it, sit on it nor even look at it because, from her point of view, the entire design looked far too much like a bat in flight and she absolutely refused to give her mark of approval.
So sure was she that my tranquil little pool was a monstrosity, which, once she labeled it such, I was forced to admit to myself truly was reminiscent of a blood sucking, haunted house dwelling, winged terror, that she invited neighbors over to validate her opinion. She did so before I had a chance to stain the spongy boards a cheerful red color to distract from the bat like appearance and before I sat enough potted plants on the deck to ensure there was no room for anyone to actually step onto it.
Neighbors agreed that the design was a bit bat like and even commented something along the lines of my off centered placement resulting in the look of not only a bat but a crooked bat.
As the mocking of my efforts continued, my little hairless dog Opie, whose nose when pointed upwards is, I was about to learn, about 14” high, came running out into the yard to join me. Heeding not the “Stay Off the Deck” warning, my little guy toppled right into the 12” deep trough. In absolute shock that his yard had given way to water, he stood there, frozen in disbelief, with not much more than his snout above the water’s surface.
I quickly took him inside to dry him off and to escape the humiliation which had overtaken both Opie and me.
Jo-Ann, when she came back into the house, also expressed a worry about snakes crawling under my bat wings, just in case the whole pond effort was not seeming quite failed enough.
The next day, wondering if I could redeem the appearance, somehow strengthen the boards to support the weight of someone over the age of three and find a way to prevent my pooches from drowning, I went outside to examine my project. As I stood staring at it, a snake slithered from the ferns and crawled beneath the bat wing portion of the boards.
Year two of the water feature build ended the same as had year one. After the serpent had moved on, I dug the basin up, disassembled the box, stacked the useless 1X4s and stored the liner.
Alas, May came around again this year and I had a week-long vacation from work. For the third May in a row, I decided to build a water fountain.
I had actually been designing the thing in my head all year long. Sometime in February, I began drawing it out, tweaking the design, examining and reexamining it for any potential bat like appearances or snake attracting features and keeping the whole basin design elevated above ground so as not to be the death of little Opie.
I actually, through the trial and failures of previous efforts, by browsing page after page of Internet ideas (but NEVER peeking at HGTV pages lest Amy Matthews inspire me again), by way of my own sketches and even by simply daydreaming, came up with a really nice design.
Vacation began and while I had no delusions of being able to finish the project in a weekend, I was quite sure I’d soon have an incredibly nice water feature which Opie would survive, of which Jo-Ann would approve and which the neighbors would envy rather than criticize.
I went to Home Depot, approximately 15 times per day as I always needed something which I did not have and did not even know existed until I needed it, and to a local tile store to buy slate for the above ground box. I rented a truck from Home Depot, later hired a truck driver to haul yet more stuff and, at last, was ready to get to work.
Alas, in spite of much planning and many trips, the project stalled for several days at Step 1.
I am not sure how many steps there were going to be but Step 1 was to get that ding dang level foundation that had thwarted my every effort thus far. Even when staying above ground and, perhaps, especially when staying above ground, a level surface simply must be had.
In hopes of creating a smooth and level surface, I banged, with a rubber mallet, concrete caps into the sandy area which I had cleared. By the appearance of all the cracked concrete tops, one would have thought I had used a sledge hammer, which I obviously had not done as I do not even own a sledge hammer because they are, well, so very, very heavy.
My vacation time was drawing to an end and I had nothing but supplies from the many trips to the home improvement stores to show. No water feature, no envy of the neighborhood, just another dismal and failed attempt. I completely and totally gave up.
Jo-Ann, well aware of my disappointment and, after the previous year’s bat design, knowing what I was capable of settling for, did what I would not- she called and sought help.
Her plea for assistance was made to Ying, our friend and neighbor who is also the wife of my friend and running partner, Stale, who actually knows which end of a hammer to hold without consulting Google.
A few minutes later, Stale (rhymes with “bowler” not “ale”, well, not exactly with bowler, but far closer) showed up.
He backed his truck into the driveway and opened the tail gate to reveal tools. Not just any tools, REAL tools, the kind that require electricity to work.
I explained that Step 1, my nemesis for the past three years, was to get a level area on which to build.
An hour later, a frame hand been built and the remaining bags of quickcrete which had sat in my garage undisturbed since I learned that they eat flesh off a body, had been poured into the frame mold.
The next morning, a perfectly level- and I mean that literally as Stale used one of those rulers that have bubbles in them to ensure things are straight and level- base upon which to build awaited.
After three years of trying, Step 2 could actually legitimately be started!
I simply told Stale, in vague terms, my construction idea. Soon, holes were dug, 4X4s were sank and more concrete was poured (after being mixed with a concrete mixer drill attachment rather than by hand).
I could not believe how solid the frame was the next morning. Forget toddlers, a grown man could have swung from the beam that joined the two end posts. I will neither confirm nor deny that a grown man, so happy to be seeing progress, actually did swing, ape like from the overhead beam.
The aforementioned power tools had cut boards, driven screws, cut tiles and sawed designs.
In only a few hours, Stale had completely accomplished what I had been unable to even begin in the past week or, really, during the past three years.
To say that Stale helped me would be altogether inaccurate as that declaration would indicate that I actually did something to assist his efforts.
At one point, I did attempt to help. He handed me a gigantic, square pencil to mark a board as he held a guide in place. Mid-way through my outlining, Stale mentioned that the pencil actually had to be flipped over to work properly, as I had the lead pointed upwards. The whole lack of an eraser at the end and the square design of the pencil, as well as the fact that it was manufactured to be used on job sites rather than in classrooms, completely confused me.
Stale didn’t ask for much in the way of assistance afterwards so I simply stood in awe and amazement at his ability and know-how, complimented his workmanship and, occasionally offered water.
All in all, I served no purpose on the job site other than describing what I would like to have done and providing eye candy to all the gawkers who passed by. Stale was sufficiently busy and far too sweaty and dirty to also play that role; it truly was the least I, as clean and camera ready as Amy Matthews at her best, could do.
When it comes to my construction efforts, less is definitely more.
Today, I put down rocks and added some landscaping around the Asian-style Rain Tower and added the final, non-construction touches to the project.
As I listened to the water dripping down into the basin from the hidden hoses and pipes that run overhead, I was so soothed by the gentle sound and so relieved by the final completion of the project that I refused to even let bother me the snake that crawled over to also take a look.
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