Age Has Its Privileges

“Howard, you realize what we’re doing, don’t you?” I asked my husband as we sat in the backyard staring at his “water garden.” “We’re acting like old people,” I laughed. That’s what it reminded me of as we kept adding this or that trinket or embellishment to his creation.

It all started when we had accidentally gotten a statue that had a hose opening for a fountain. I was upset when I hadn’t got the one which reminded me of my granddaughter, Anne-Marie, until I realized this one looked like her little sister, Maddie. Anyway, my husband had activated the fountain feature, and the water really added interest and visual impact, like something alive and moving.

Howard had placed a birdbath bowl on the ground beneath the trickle of water spilling over the edge of a large seashell the little girl held in her lap. Beside it stood the figure of the little boy pouring from the jug; and although there was no water in it, it was still very effective. The whole arrangement included a slatted bench, a birdfeeder hanging on a bracket fastened to the support of a yard swing and a pair of lop-eared resin/stone bunnies which seemed to be sipping from the bowl.

We needed more foliage for a natural look, though, since the trees were farther back. “Just to see how it will look, I can bring an artificial plant from the front porch,” I offered. The big, fringed leaves of the plant were very realistic nestled around the fountain, wet and glistening from being hosed off. Howard liked it, and I remembered another life-like plant I had, and shortly added it to give the rabbits cover.

From there it was searching for rocks to balance the plants, then bringing a smaller grotto-like fountain to sit in the bird bath and continue the waterfall as it spilled into it. I seemed to be doing most of the work here, getting into the project as the director made suggestions. “We need the water to come down over the boy,” he noted. So I positioned a wide plant leaf to catch the water and act as a trough. Nature made it look so easy, but my artificial leaf still worked, just like in the animated Disney forest scenes when the water drops musically down the foliage.

One thing led to another, what with another rabbit, an additional decorative birdbath and a few bricks brought from the front, until I made the comment about old people. Well, we are in our early 70’s, the “young-old” (80’s being “old” and “old-old” beyond that), but I will draw the line when he starts putting up windmills and birds with propeller-wings in trees!