Flood

Water, water, everywhere...

It began raining hard last night and the dry creek behind the house was rushing merrily along when we woke. Will Cole and I went for a walk around and it was amazing to see what the water had already done. Then it began to really rain. We went out again, in the pour, to see what was happening. It's astounding to see how water can rise in one hour...

We walked out into the field in front of the house and the dry bed looked like this.

 An hour later, same trees from another angle.

 

This is the gate to the creek. They made the posts from railroad tied set four feet into the ground. In the night the water flowed so hard it pushed the posts sideways and jammed the gate.

The debris left in the field from the flooding in the night.

 The field in an hour.

 We went down to the creek to see how high it had gotten. This is the first time.

This is the second.

We made it to the swinging bridge and the water had risen and was flowing fast enough to make a little white-water further down.

 This is how much it had risen in an hour. The water is usually 10-12 feet beneath the bridge.

This is the same view below the bridge. Look at the current now.

Here is a view of the dirt road from the field.

This is the road you drive down to come to my house. If you can...

Then we returned home to find all the ponds on the farms above us had overflowed. The chicken house was surrounded.

We have a whirlpool being carved into the bank. Yes, that is the corner of the house you see. The water is that close.

The bridge of two trees covered with boards that Will made was hard to move with the tractor, yet the force of the water is making it tremble and bob.

We've been inside for a while, soaked clothes stripped off, and wrapped in something cozy. As I write, the water falls away again, in leaps, bounds, and gulps. A flood strips away the unclean, moves the dead and fallen, uproots trees, takes out fences. It renews, changes, tears down, builds up. It may not always be the changes we want, but the water does not know we exist. It is simply a force to be reckoned with, fascinating and terrible at once.

 And there is more rain in the forecast.