Ah yes, my landscaping work.  The back yard was a mess.  There was a retaining wall that wasn’t retaining much, there were stepping-stones beneath inches of wet decaying leaves and muck, there was mud.  There were bricks, rocks, slate and overgrown I don’t know whats.  My raking  just to clear the path  turned into landscaping which turned into demolition of a retaining wall  which turned into  completely regrading the yard.

This required digging, and dig I did.  I removed pounds of dirt, along with natural stone, and man-made brick and  concrete.  I made archeological  finds — railroad ties, nails, barn and shutter hinges all likely from the 1800’s.  I uncovered a mysterious  large concrete block with an iron  pipe through it — still don’t know what the heck that was, but  it was too heavy and went too deep for me to move so I buried it again.

I removed brush and plantings gone wild.   Dig around the roots,  flip and pull.  It was kinda cool.  And I was transforming my new home from a very scary place to what I hoped would be a cute little Victorian actually worthy of saving rather than one step from the wrecking ball.  The kids were, as usual, and like many of today’s healthy red-blooded children, inside.  They were  enjoying some sort of technology, while I toiled outside in the fresh air.   I was on my own.  No power tools.  No help.

When I  was digging and moving earth I  pulled up some trash bag type plastic.  Okay, I’d already pulled a lot of this stuff up.  The prior owners used garbage bags as landscaping fabric.  As I pulled I saw that the garbage bag had something light-colored in it –some white cloth.  I wondered, “Now what could this be?  A buried treasure, maybe?”    I dug and  pulled.

Just like with the shrubs gone wild, I dug around it, started to flip it out of the  dirt, reached down (with gloves of course) for one last pull . . . and . . .

AAAAAAAhhhhhhh!!!! 

I’m not usually a screamer.

But when I  pulled, the bag ripped open and  the cloth fell out.    The cloth was stained,  had  something  stuck to it,   something . . . that appeared . . .  to . . . be  —- HAIR !!!!  This is what turned me into a screamer.

SH*T!

I ran inside to get  a  kid, any one of them would do.  I needed a witness (well actually, support).   The youngest ones  were curious enough to venture out into the sun.   And we, of course,  did the mature thing.

                          We took a stick and poked at it.

Because, not only was it a cheese cloth like old world material, brown blood stained and showing bits of hair type stuff,  it had a  bulge in it.

                          So, we poked some more.

My optimistic child said the bits of hair like stuff  was really mulch.  Gotta love her — but the stuff was not mulch.    I untangled the  cloth with a stick, revealed and uncovered   . . . some skin, a skull and bones.  EWWWWWWW!

I had  exhumed a pet of the prior owners.  I didn’t need to call in CSI or NCIS or any of the Law and Order folks to figure that out.   Thank God it wasn’t the remains of a human.  Remember, this is the 150 year old house of Piss, Puke, and Porn — it could have been anything.

By the size and shape of the skull I surmised that this thing had once been a guinea pig, maybe a rabbit, possibly a kitten.    It must have been a cherished pet at one time since it seemed to have had a proper burial — complete with a white shroud.   And, I presume, it was resting in peace.  That is,  until I got to it.  EWWWWWW!

There is a beautiful contemporary country song, sung by Miranda Lambert, featured on her album, Revolution,  called  “The House That Built Me.”  It’s about a troubled adult going back to visit her childhood home to get grounded. Miranda sings to the current owners of her old house. . .

I bet you didn’t know under that live oak,
My favorite dog is buried in the yard.

The House That Built Me

Yeah, okay, Miranda.   Love the song, it makes me cry.  But as the new owner of the  former childhood home of somebody, where  somebody  buried their pet in the yard and  moved away —  only to leave poor unsuspecting landscaping me to dig it up . . .  well, it’s not quite the same sentiment.

EWWWWWW!

More sticks and a shovel were used to dispose of the remains, remains that the kids now wanted to keep.   I caved and we left the skull out for  the rest of the day.   Other critters must have carried it away during the night because it was gone  by morning.

Just Me With . . .  lots of  dirt, a shovel, and apparently —  a pet cemetery.  EWWWWW!!!!!

This house had some bad mojo, no joke.  See, What Happened In My House? Murder?