Dirt. No Dirt. Dirt. No Dirt. Dirt. No Dirt.

We are finally closing in on the end of having a new septic system installed. The journey began in February. Our county sanitarian and I have become nearly best friends. We have talked often on the phone. But, our friendship is based on human waste.

The company that we hired to do the septic system comes highly recomended. But, the company didn't want to start the job until the ground was very dry. Like, late June. The sanitarian didn't like that, especially since sewage seemed to be draining out a pipe and down a hill on our property. I could see his point. I did some digging as he asked to try and find the break in the drain tile line which may have been causing it to divert there instead of into the drainage field. I dug and dug and dug and dug. I found break upon break in the drainage tile. The sanitarian said that I could stop digging as I had done everything within reason to try and stop it.

So the septic company put in the tanks at the end of June. But, the couldn't put the new drain field in then simply due to other jobs. They finally attempted around July 23rd, but couldn't due to rain. The rain made the ground soft, which meant their big trucks were sinking in my lawn. So, they started Monday.

My wife and I were going to keep most/all of the dirt. But, they had to dig down a lot further than was originally anticipated to get to good sand. See, sand helps drain away waste and things. Instead of digging down the original 10' they had planned to, the ended up digging down 23'. Yes, down 23'. So 10' wide, by 60' long, by 23' long equals a lot of cubic feet of dirt.

Jean, thinking of me, wanted them to take it away as that was a lot of dirt to move around. But, I wanted to build her a cool retaining wall so that we could have more usable yard and that she could put her vegetable garden in.

Well, Jean told the guy who owns the septic installation company that we didn't want the dirt. He wasn't a happy camper. I came home. We talked over keeping the dirt. He was all set to put up a silt fence for us until we got the wall built. Then, he was concerned that the clay would be too heavy against the retaining wall, and that we would have water leaks in our basement because the pipe that drains water away from our basement would be obstructed. So, I told him to take it away. He wasn't happy because empty trucks were sitting there for over half a day that could have been taking dirt away. But, he'll get paid for his time. And, we won't have to worry about breaking retaining walls, or bad septic systems. This morning he said that the drainage field we had was pretty much useless. It couldn't hold anymore. I will miss seeing him every morning when I leave for work. I will also miss the loud equipment. Will I be able to think without them there? Will our kids be able to nap with out the noise? I sure hope so. The final tally was 45 truck fulls of dirt which equaled 400 cubic yards hauled out.