Another one from my yard. I have Daylilies that line the stone path on the side of my house leading all the way to my backyard. They are so beautiful when they bloom and I just adore them.

This weekend was spent doing pretty much nothing but yard work. Now that we are putting the leaky oil tank fiasco behind us, it's time to bring back the beauty to the house and yard. The nearly 2 year nightmare of the environmental clean-up from the leaking tank has really soured me on homeownership and caused me to allow my gardens in the back to fall fallow because I just didn't care anymore. It was just too depressing to even go out there and look at them. But now I feel a little better about things and I'm starting to get excited about bringing it all back. (I still want to move into a condo when it's time to retire though at this point!)

We had just replaced our front door, painted the house, replaced shutters, and redone the landscaping in the front a month or so before we found out about the leaking oil tank so you can just imagine how it felt to see it all get completely torn up when they dug the 30x30x14 foot deep hole in our yard to remove the contaminated soil. We lost the entire driveway, and most of the front yard and sidewalks. We managed to save just my weeping cherry tree that we planted when we moved in and the flowering pear at the street which was also planted when we moved in, everything else was either torn out or severely damage by the huge equipment they used to dig.

A few weeks ago we replaced the front steps which were collapsing from being undermined when the contaminated soil was removed so close to them. In a couple of weeks we will have a new driveway, and sidewalks and in the Fall the landscaping will hopefully get done.

We just got word today that our final report is nearly ready to be sent off to the State which will then be reviewed by the Department of Environmental Protection, who will then, hopefully, please God, declare the clean-up satisfactory and release us from any further action, thus ending this nightmare. We had 2 very clean water and soil samples come back in a row which was a huge relief, and somewhat unexpected considering the amount of contamination we had, so we are pretty confident that we are good to go after 2 years and nearly $100,000. (Insurance covered most everything, thank God.) We had the sad distinction of being one of the worst residential clean-ups they; our oil company, the environmental services company, insurance companies (both homeowner's and separate oil tank insurance) and the insurance companies' consultants had seen in the State, lucky us!!!

I think a neighbor on the next block is just starting to go through the same ordeal themselves. They have a very familiar scene playing out on their front yard and driveway as I type this. I am tempted to knock on their door and offer my sympathy and support for their plight. It is so stressful since there was actually one point at which we were prepared for the possibility that we might lose the house if the contamination had gone under the foundation. As it is, when this whole ordeal starts, your house is more of a liability than an asset. You cannot sell it, you could try I suppose, but no one would likely buy it, and it is virtually worthless until the State says it's "clean" which can take another 2 years, possibly longer. Worst case scenario would be they require further monitoring of soil and water and the extremely remote possibility of more remediation.

My brother and sister in law are also about to pull their oil tank which is about the same age and size as ours was (1948 and 1000 gallons). They are really worried about it because they don't have the oil tank insurance we had since we bought this house back in 1993. They don't want to put it off any longer though since the tank is a ticking timebomb if it hasn't leaked yet it will someday soon considering it's age. The stat we were quoted was about 1 in 9 of these old tanks are leaking. I think they will be ok statistically since we were 1 and our neighbor is 2. I pray that they have no leaks and no contamination to deal with.

Check out my other Photoblog:
"Parallel Universe"

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