Dropping Napalm Might Be An Easier Way To Go

Does anyone have $35,000 they want to lend give me? Anyone? Come on, now, show of hands. No one? Damn. I was afraid of that.

I'm pretty sure I have previously mentioned that Oscar and I bought our house from my parents. It's a nice house, but the selling point is that it has a huge yard. It's perfect for parties or bleeding the energy out of a rambunctious preschooler. Or, at least, it would be, if the yard was in any sort of shape for those kinds of activities. My parents were very busy people, and didn't have much time to give the landscaping, so there was never anything special done with it. And for the first few years that Oscar and I lived her by our lonesomes, we didn't have much time to give the landscaping either. So what landscaping there was, and there wasn't much, died quickly and, well, I'm ashamed to say that we didn't do much to stop it.

Now, though, I am home more often than not, and even though I spend my days chasing a rambunctious preschooler around, I have more time for things like putting around the gardens. The problem is, things have degraded to the point that I can't bring it back all on my own. I'm only one person. And a small one at that. (Well, height-wise, anyway. In terms of the vertical, I am wee. But in terms of the horizontal - well - let's just say that I will never be mistaken for Nicole Richie.) I only have so much room in the green waste bins every week. And I don't own a Bobcat, so I can't rip down trees in a single bound. I can try to stop the bleeding, but I can't make any progress on bringing things back to their green, lovely place.

So we called a landscaper. We actually have plans to call three. But so far, we've only called one, and that one came out today and looked at our yard. And when he stopped bawling like a little baby, and stopped praying to God that he got this job so he could buy his new boat, he told us that he figured it would cost about $10,000 to clean things up and between $30,000-$35,000 from start to finish, depending on the design of the new landscape. I can't say I was surprised, but I can't say I was thrilled, either.

I'm not making any decisions on what to do next until we get the other two quotes and I am completely convinced that I'm not going to have a heart attack at the thought of spending tens of thousands of dollars to make my house look like it should. But I did like the guy, and I am swayed by the promise of having a yard I can actually use. It would be nice to be able to take Turtle out in the back yard and let him run around like a little boy should. It would be nice to feel comfortable inviting people over and hosting pool parties, instead of being ashamed to tell people where I live because of how bad the house looks. It would be nice to be able to walk in the door without being attacked by a rogue bougainvillea, who has decided that he is so over the outdoors and his dream has always been to be an indoor bougainvillea, and if he could just get one branch in the door, we would see what a great indoor bougainvillea he would be! (Seriously. That little bugger is persistent.)

So although my stomach clenches at the thought of taking that much equity out of the house, I know it would be worth it. And even though I'm not committed to this particular landscaper (especially since he didn't even offer to take us out on the new boat he was going to buy after he did our yard! Bastard!) I will call my lenders tomorrow and see what they can do about getting my house refinanced. But in the meantime? If anyone wins the lottery and you decide to donate to the "Help Cymber Not Be Ashamed Of Her Crappy Yard" fund, you know where to find me. I'll be in the fetal position in the corner, whimpering about points and loan-to-value ratios.