Missing From the Picture

 One more shot of the greenhouse from an angle I haven't taken before, from the comfort of the deck off the back of our house. The reason for me not taking a picture from this location until now can be explained by the vague circle like spot in the lower part of the picture. Until a couple days ago, a trampoline used to reside there.

When my oldest reached jumping age, about the same time as her younger sister was born, my mom bought her a trampoline. It was one of those giant things about the size of a room with a mesh wall encircling it so stray children wouldn't go flying off of it. It was so big, for many years I had to go out to lift my daughter up onto it or off of it. With the configuration of our yard, there aren't very many flat spots to put such a huge affair and so I assembled it directly over our firepit.

Less than a week later, a straight line derecho with 100 mph winds was forecasted as heading our way and so I drug it up to the deck and lashed it to the house with yards of rope. It didn't blow away but after that, I bought four ground anchors and some strand wire cable and permanently attached it to the ground over the firepit. It wasn't fast or easy to move and so we've had very limited fires outside ever since. 

As you can see above, some weeds and grass, mostly creeping charlie, have overtaken the fire pit so you can't see any of the protective paving surrounding it nor the actual pit itself. It needs some work and I have it on my to do list when I tackle the back patio and landscaping underneath the deck, perhaps next year. 

I'm guessing the trampoline was around 11 or 12 years old and it looked well beyond life expectancy. All the foam encasing the poles holding up the safety net has simply vanished into fine particles of degradation. The vinyl cover over the springs to prevent errant legs or other body parts from entering was mostly gone and what remained was as pliable as a fresh Dorito.  The main trampoline pad itself had numerous runs and checks through it like a pair of pantyhose after a run through a forest. The galvanized metal support structure was rusting and as I found out soon enough, full of water that was leeching in from somewhere. It was time to put the thing out of its misery. I haven't seen either of our girls on it in over a year.

So while they were at school, I disassembled the trampoline, loaded it in the van along with other accumulated debris and made a run to the town dump. There they have huge truck size recycling bins where all the metal bits and pieces could go for other uses and a nearby similar sized trailer for the rest. I paid them for the privilege of using those bins. It has been three days since I hauled it away and neither of my daughters has noticed it being gone. I'm sure it will be missed when they realize it but like most kids, forgotten about five minutes later.

I should have taken a picture of it but didn't. It was an eyesore. That probably explains why just about every picture taken in its vicinity over the years was angled this way or that so that it was essentially cropped out of the picture. Maybe next year when I get the lower patio and landscaping done, along with rehabbing the firepit, perhaps I can start posting more pictures of that missing area behind our house.