The Great Fountain Mystery
I’m not a yard person. Meaning I don’t like yard work. In fact I don’t do it. I have a gardener. The house I live in now, the gardener is provided by the property management company and included in my rent. The gardener comes on Thursday afternoon. Because the gardener works for the property management company instead of me, we don’t have conversations. We don’t talk about the dead looking banana trees that they never trim. We don’t talk about the flowering tree that hangs over the back fence and gate and is so overgrown that it feels like a jungle. In fact other than the occasional sound of the lawnmower in the backyard when I go home for lunch, or the tell tale sign of the back gate being left open, I’d never even know the gardener had been there. They mow the grass and that’s about it.

I like my house better than any house I’ve lived in as an ‘adult’. It’s got a big front yard that wraps around the house and a nice size back yard. If it wasn’t for my neighbor’s annoying cats camping out in my yard it would be idyllic. The front yard even came with a good size fountain near the front door in what I guess would be the flower bed if it had flowers instead of shrubs.



I never gave the fountain much thought. It was pretty to look at but wasn’t a working fountain with water and all. My friend’s little girl once filled it with wild flowers she pulled from the grass. But to me it was just a yard ornament. That was until recently.

“What happened to the fountain in your yard?” My dad asked.

“I don’t know. What’s wrong with it?”

“It’s missing.” Dad stated.

“Missing!”

“Yeah its gone. Didn’t you notice?”

I rarely use my front door. I always enter my house through the side door after parking the car in the garage. So I hadn’t noticed the fountain was gone.

Now there is a pipe sticking up out of a slab of cement where the fountain used to be.



It looks strange.

I have to ask. Who in their right mind would steal a fountain? And how does someone steal a fountain?

Do a bunch of guys sitting around drinking beer decide to steal a fountain on a drunken dare and pull up in front of my house in the middle of the night with tools and strong arm the fountain into a truck?

It has to be the oddest thing to steal.

I have to admit; my first thought was to suspect the gardener. But since we don’t talk about the yard, I didn’t think I could accuse him of stealing the fountain.

And then there is the dilemma of telling the property management company that someone stole the fountain from the front yard. Would they make me pay for it? I wondered.

I still don’t know the answer to that one.

The other day a friend and I were driving past Las Palmas Nursery on Coffee Road and we both noticed all the fountains and fancy garden ornaments.

“There’s your fountain.” My friend joked.

I laughed. But I couldn’t help but wonder… Is there a black market for yard fountains?

It’s a mystery.

Labels: annoying cats, Bakersfield, flowers, Fountain, gardening, Mystery, yard work

  posted by Matildakay at 9:39 PM 8 comments