Our driveway is half a mile long. It's a bit strange, since all the other houses on our street are within 100 ft of the road, but we kind of like the privacy. (Although, ask me again after our first winter, and we'll see if all that snow on the driveway changes my mind!) The driveway is a one-lane gravel road, with potholes on it. I figure, if we're going to be driving back and forth on this road on a regular basis (which we already are), I wanted to try to level it out some. So I flexed my muscles a bit, loaded up a wheelbarrow with a shovel and heavy-duty rake, and headed out to go fill in the holes. There is large gravel/dirt/shale pile on the property that I used as filler. I went and filled my wheelbarrow with as much as I could heft, and started filling holes. I'd dump some dirt in a hole, rake it level, then stomp on it with my feet to pack it down a bit, and maybe throw more dirt on there if it still wasn't level. Then I'd head back for more dirt and move to the next pothole. At one point, Orrin and Oliver came and helped for a bit, which mostly meant that I held Oliver while Orrin gave me a break with shoveling and raking. Then Oliver and I did the “pothole dance” to pack it down.
The more holes I filled, and the further I got from the pile of dirt/gravel, the harder my arms had to work to heft that wheelbarrow. A few hours later, I had spaghetti arms, and most of the holes were filled. I probably need a couple more wheelbarrows worth of dirt to finish the job, but was pretty happy with what I'd gotten done. It was a pretty basic kind of task to do, playing with dirt and shovels, but very fulfilling. I got to enjoy our forest, with the leaves starting to change color now, and a warm, cloudy fall day.
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