The Fence

Robert Frost wrote, "Good Fences make good neighbors." Our fence has given our friends and neighbors something to talk about when we meet. Klep is in the process or replacing the old cypress fence that the boys built during the last year Rob was at home. We used untreated cypress lumber from a sawmill near by, and now, twenty years later it needs to come down.

We need the fence across the front of our yard because we live on a busy state road. It has become busier each year we have lived here. The fence gives us a little delineation from the sidewalk and the traffic. It has also, a couple of times, kept a speeding car from ending up in our yard.

Klep has changed the design and the materials. We are using all treated materials. He says that twenty years down the road he is not going to be ready to do this again. The palings are four inch dogeared and are slightly less than four feet tall. The design team decided that we liked the looks of it as well as we did our original which was a curved top. I think that the engineer in Klep likes the level aspect of the new design. He is using a level as the spacer between palings and a line of strings from post to post to insure that the line is true.

Slowly but surely the fence is marching east down our block. It is approaching the one hundred foot mark which is an important point. Tomorrow he will probably reach the sidewalk leading to the front door of the house. The gate over this, of course will be the last thing built and placed.

We look forward to the visiting that will come when we start painting the fence. If it is anything like the other times we have painted the fence, both strangers and friends will stop to say something about the painting. There, evidently, is a little Tom Sawyer in all of us when it comes to fence painting.

So, even if Robert Frost could not foresee the interest in building a fence as a chance to socialize and come together, it seems that ours has that effect.