Rock Walls and Columns

I built a curved rock sidewalk from our driveway and patio to our back door 32 years ago.  After I had completed it, I built a rock wall that follows that same curve, and in the area between them we have planted hostas and other plants over the years.  I know when I built that wall because I unearthed a picture from an old photo album that says our daughter Katy was two years old, which would have made it 1988.  I know I had just completed it in this picture because the taught string that I used to make its top level is still in place.  Katy's holding a little whisk broom that I am still using to this day for rock work.

That seems like such a long time ago!  In the intervening years, Katy grew into a beautiful and talented young woman, her dad lost a good bit of hair on top of his head, and that jeep in the background was hauled to the junkyard decades ago.  And that same wall today is covered with moss and thrift.

That's one thing I like about rock walls - they will be there for a long, long time.  They will endure.  We see the remains of rock walls, foundations, and chimneys everywhere that have survived the houses they were once attached to, like this chimney I took a photo of several years ago.  

There is a good chance that this rock wall I built 32 years ago will be there as long as that chimney.  I built it on a good foundation, and I installed "weepholes" every few feet, short lengths of galvanized steel pipe that permit moisture to escape from the bank behind it and thus prevent it from buckling or cracking.  I wrote a poem about building walls like this many years ago.

I don't know why I terminated the wall the way I did, simply stopping abruptly just outside our back door.  I may have had something in mind like an outdoor fireplace at the time, or some stone steps leading up to the compost bins.  But I am glad that I left it incomplete, waiting for the right time to come along.

Could I ever have imagined at the time that these many years later I would be building a column there incorporating rocks collected from around the country, fished from the Pacific Ocean, picked up from the desert in Arizona, or a mountain in Maine? 

Stand firm, good column.