Tired, But Satisfied...

I have been trying to think of an adjective to adequately describe the level of fatigue I'm feeling. Unfortunately, I am so tired I cannot think of a good descriptor. This is a good tired though, one that comes after a long day of physical work.

Scott is home for Spring Break this week. We have been talking about landscaping our yard for several years. Until today, we have never made a real effort in that direction. This morning though, the stars seemed to align and we were finally going to tackle our yard.

We live only five miles from a rock quarry and discovered that they charge only $15 a ton. Compared to the $180 we were quoted for the same product to be delivered from a landscape company, we realized that we were going to save a lot of money if we picked up the materials ourselves. Our neighbor told us that they have double shredded mulch at our local county "recycling" center. All we have to do is drive there and they scoop it into the truck. Free trumps paying anytime in my book.

The weather was beautiful this morning. We agreed that today would be the ideal day to tackle the yard. I called and rented a pick-up truck, slurped down a cup of coffee and we headed out the door.

We stopped by the quarry on the way home to pick up our first load of stone. Two tons of rocks were scooped into the bed of the truck, to the delight of my little boy. He loved being close to loaders "dig dig digging." It was the highlight of his day!

4,000 pounds of rock doesn't look like a lot when it is in the bed of a truck. Let me assure you, it is indeed a lot of stones. It took Scott and I, working together with the assistance of an overly helpful toddler, an hour to clear the rocks out of the truck bed and to pile them on the driveway. We did two runs to the quarry, shoveling out a total of 8,000 pounds of rocks and stones.

After we were done unloading the rocks, we decided to "make the most" of having the truck. We headed to the recycling center to pick up mulch. We drove home, shoveled the mulch out of the truck bed into another pile in the driveway, and headed back for a second load.

We worked all day shoveling landscaping materials out of the back of a rented truck bed. My arms are tired and my hands hurt. My back is starting to stiffen and I suspect I'm going to be feeling the exertion tomorrow. To my surprise, my leg does not hurt at all!

I was able to keep up with Scott moving literally tons of rocks and mulch. Although I was hoping for a respite, my leg never began to ache. At one point I was actually lamenting the fact that I didn't have a valid excuse to take a break. I was physically able and felt compelled to continue helping.

When I first had my amputation, I never envisioned a day when I would be shoveling 8,000 pounds of rock. Today my prosthetic did not hamper my ability to physically exert myself. I not only moved thousands of pounds of rock, but I shoveled and raked tons of mulch. I impressed Scott and myself!

We are tired tonight and sore. However, we accomplished our goal of securing our supplies. We got a lot of materials unloaded and saved a lot of money by doing it ourselves. If we can physically recover without spending the money we saved on a chiropractor, we can consider the day a success!