It's Mine, You Can't Have It

“Whoa, that’s great rock pile! There must be a thousand rocks in there. And some of them are huge. I could really use those to fill in the hole where we are going to lay the concrete slab for our house.”

           “Oh no. These rocks are like my friends, we’ve been through a lot together. I wouldn’t let you drop them under a concrete slab!”

           I was taken aback that the old lady was going to hold out on giving me those rocks. I was going to have to pay hundreds of dollars to have a truck bring in rocks to fill in that hole. We’d be pouring later in the week. It would save me a bundle.

           We stood looking at the enormous mound of rocks and boulders. It was twenty feet long, 6 feet high and as wide as it was long. I wondered if we should stand so close because a rock might roll down and hurt us.

           We’d just met. I was building a house nearby and had gone down the road and across the county road to introduce myself and meet my new neighbor. It was a beautiful summer day.  Her acreage was covered with bed after bed of flowers and vegetables, mostly tomatoes. She was hoeing around her flowers when I approached. She was old, with a safari hat pulled over short grey hair. She looked like a man in her work boots and overalls.

           I had introduced myself, “I’m Jamie. I’m the one building the house.”

           That’s when I went over to the pile of rocks behind the main garden and asked her if she would give them to me. It took a second for me to realize she was refusing to give me her rocks.

           “What do you need them for?” I asked.

           “Oh, there are so many things you can do with a pile of rocks. When we first moved here, thirty years ago, these rocks were spread all over the property. I spent years putting the rocks in the wagon and dragging them into the garden.  When we dug the trenches for water and power, so many rocks came up. There were rocks everywhere. I was younger then. I used to make rock edges for the vegetable beds and I dug holes to set in rock walkways between the rock beds. I had rock benches, and rocks around all the trees. It was beautiful.”

           I was just starting where she had been thirty years before, developing a new five acre lot. My wife and I were excited, but we didn’t have a lot of money and we had to do a big fill before we could lay the pad for our house. The old lady’s house was solid reinforced wood with balconies and sunrooms and decks. It had the look of a little house that had been added on to many times.

           “But now it’s just a pile of rocks,” I pointed out to her.

           “Well, after about fifteen years, by the time I had everything designed with rocks, I realized rocks just provide habitat for rodents and bugs and weeds. The only way to keep the weeds out was to spray with herbicide, and I don’t like doing that. I started digging the rocks out and putting them in this pile.

           “It took another fifteen years to take it all apart. We finally had enough money to buy a four-wheeler to pull the wagon because as I got older, I couldn’t pull that wagon full of rocks anymore. But I still lifted those suckers up. Look how big some of them are. Of course, the really big ones, I rolled.”

           I looked around and saw that the beds were enclosed in neat, wood boxes surrounded by mowed, grass walkways. There were no rocks to be seen, except in the pile.

           “And now it’s just a pile of rocks,” I reminded her again.

           “You’re telling me. Like I said, I’ve been working on this pile for fifteen years. I’ve personally, with my own hands, moved every single one of them.”

           “I really need these rocks,” I told her. “Our place is in the meadow. We don’t have many rocks.”

           She looked at me. Her face was like leather, from too much sun, I assumed.

           “How would you move them?” she asked.

           “Do you still have the four-wheeler and wagon?”

           “No, after my husband died, somebody stole it. I’m back to using the little wagon.”

           “I could put them in my pickup bed.”

           “Hum. I was still thinking of making a wall with them.”

           “A wall to what?”

           “Oh, I don’t know. I suppose I’m too old for that now. I guess I could help you. Are you married?”

           “I am,” I told her, “but my wife works in town. She puts in long days and she’s not into moving rocks.”

           She gazed lovingly at the rock pile.

           “I don’t know,” she said again, “I’d like to help you, but I’m not sure I want to give them up.”

           I knew I was time to let it go. She wanted to keep her rocks.

           “Okay, well, nice to meet you,” I said. “Good luck with your rocks.”

           “Wait,” she said as I turned to go, “You’d have to move them to the driveway. There’s no way to get the pickup to the pile.”

           “If you could move them, I guess I could too.”

           She looked doubtful, “I hate to think of them buried under a concrete slab. They might never move again after that.”

           “Are rocks supposed to move,” I asked her.

           “I’m not sure if the rocks are supposed to move, but I feel like I’m supposed to move rocks.”

           I looked at her again. Was she crazy?

           “Are you retired?” I asked her.

           “Yes, my husband and I were teachers. We worked on this place every spare minute. My husband wasn’t into moving rocks either.”

           I thought I’d try a different approach.

           “I think the rocks would be happy supporting the slab under our house,” I said. “They would be performing an important task, and they’ve already been edging for beds and walkways and a pile of rocks. I think you’re right, you’re too old to be moving rocks.”

           “Too old?” she said.

           “I mean, you look great, but what if you hurt yourself?”

           “As a matter of fact, I was thinking of moving the pile to the front of the house. I’ll scatter them about a little bit so it looks more natural. No, I’m sorry. If you can’t afford to bring in a load, I can help pay for it. It would be my housewarming gift to you. Here, let’s go to the house and I’ll write you a check. I’d be happy to.”

           “I can’t let you do that!”

           “Of course you can. Let’s go now. I won’t hear another word.”

           I did let her do it. I got my truckloads of rock and the old lady started moving her rocks to another place, in front of her house. She died before she got it done. I don’t think it was the rocks that killed her though.