In the late summer of 2024, we started experiencing well issues. Our water supply would intermittently cut out and we'd be left high and dry. The cure, for a while, was to go out to the well house and push a red reset button. That would give the pump life again, but gradually the interruptions in service become more common, and eventually the reset no longer worked. We ended up calling a professional, and he found the problem with the electrical line. Fortunately, that was relatively inexpensive, and we were soon back in business.
What we soon realized was that the well house itself was in sad shape. It was probably 20 years old and built very cheaply. These types of buildings usually are just meant to keep weather out, and they need to be able to be moved if you find yourself having to pull up the pump from the well. All that is to say that they aren't the most stable of structures. So, it was time for us to try our hand at building one. We watched a lot of YouTube videos and researched options for several weeks. We went back and forth but finally decided on the DIY course. We built it ourselves. It didn't come out too bad. When we finished in the fall, we thought we had a good looking well house and it was far sturdier than its predecessor. In a moment of silliness, I added a crow themed weathervane, and a plaque reading "The Crow's Nest". A nod to my old sailor days.
Then we had a flash of brilliance. What if we painted a mural on it? Since we hadn't had a chance to paint one for anyone in years, we were dying to do it. Laura and I decided we'd each take one side and not tell the other what we were doing, and the idea was to meet in the middle, meaning the front and back faces, and the goal would be to somehow integrate the two independent works. Great Idea!
Laura got right on it and produced, on the north wall, a really fun and whimsical fish. Her thought was that it tied in with the farm and the creek, and all that. I followed with a huge crow on the south wall, and I added a scarecrow on the West wall, along with some cornfields to cover the rest. My crow is huge, and the scarecrow is, frankly, a little creepy. I added dark and ominous skies to both sides and called those complete. I wasn't really thinking about theming except I wanted to maintain the idea of farm related imagery. I liked the result a lot, but I'll be the first to admit there's room for improvement.
This is where I messed up the theme. I really wanted to put a fun Calvin and Hobbes scene on the East wall, and I did. The issue was that it wasn't in keeping with the overall feel. It's a fun side, don't get me wrong, but it wasn't really in keeping with the goal we had set for ourselves. Still, it came out great and we're keeping it.
I consider Bill Watterson to be a genius and a true master of his chosen field. The C&H scene is a hugely popular one that everyone recognizes, and I wanted to see if I could reproduce it in scale and still keep the fun and lightness of the original.
All in all, it was a rewarding experience. We learned a lot about basic construction, and got some lessons in cooperative mural design, along with a lot of laughing and love.
