...LIKE WATER OFF A DUCK'S BACK

The weather website for my town and county is calling for "isolated showers" later today and tomorrow. I'm putting in my request right now to be ignored. It's not that my front yard wouldn't love it, but the lake winds are so strong right now (37-54km or 23-45mph) that the waves and spray hitting my back yard are towering over my breakwall even higher than the ones I posted a week or so ago. There's about a one second delay between the peak of the spray and the sound of it hitting my back windows. Sometimes it sounds like rice being thrown, sometimes it's like someone trained a hose on the glass! The drainage is getting a bit overwhelmed, and I'm hoping I don't get any problems like my neighbor has - remember the warped breakwall and the sink hole? He hasn't even had time to fill it in yet, so who knows what will happen over there.

Anyway, it's a helpless feeling, having storms of any kind. I heard there's tornado activity in Ohio right now (we could get it too) and the wind-fanned fires are back in California as well. Wish I could send them some of this! We sure don't need any rain on the lake side, but at least it isn't life-threatening. But we all just have to wait it out. And then, if you're me, go out after with a kitchen-catcher bag and a pair of BBQ tongs and pick up all the yucky plastic flotsam that's been carried over onto the lawn.

These photos are blurry because I shot them through the window, because of all the spray flying around. Then I thought I might open the door and try to get a quick shot between waves, but the wind was blowing so hard, I couldn't push the door open!! There birds have forsaken the feeders. The only one who doesn't seem to mind is the mallard, still scarfing seed under the red maple tree, with the water rolling off his back like, well...

THE POWER OF WATER

A couple of days ago I posted a series of photos of the wind-driven waves splashing against the breakwall at my back yard, and ended with a shot of water that was pooling in my neighbor's yard two doors down. Then yesterday, the fellow who does breakwall maintenance showed up with his tug and barge, and a load of big rocks (aka armor stone). As I watched out the window, the barge turned and headed very close to my place, so I grabbed my camera and headed out. I was shocked to see my neighbors' yard with a large, deep hole in it! Even worse for them, the strong metal barrier had buckled in at the top, and then flared out at the bottom as easily, it would seem, as a curtain hem billows out a raised window.

Armor stones can shift and some even sink with time, but whatever may have been in front of my neighbors' place in the past, there were no stones to prevent the buckling and the washing away of his yard when the recent winds and high water came. I don't know if there's any way they can restore the wall without making it worse; the rocks they added yesterday may be all that can be done to prevent further erosion. And then they're going to have to fill that hole with something.



It got me thinking about the power of water. Together with the wind, it bent and buckled that section of thick metal breakwall like it was nothing. At my place, it's obvious some of the previous owners have added to the pile of armor stone over decades. It may not be the prettiest bit of shoreline from certain angles, but I'm awfully glad it's there!

SLOWLY (OSI)

mountain rock pebble
fine sandy beach underfoot
slowly but surely






Photo of Clearwater River, AB from Wikimedia Commons
Visit ONE SINGLE IMPRESSION for haiku and other poetic responses to this prompt


P.S.
Many thanks to much admired blogging friends Kat and Sylvia for giving awards to this blog. Do give them a visit if you don't already, they are both a delight. I'll work on passing them along in a future post; thanks, gals!

SHORING UP THE SHORE

After living so many years in the Alberta foothills, where erosion of the Rockies takes place very slowly, it was a real eye-opener to move to the Erie shore, where serious erosion is never more than one good wind storm away, and always on residents’ minds. Most homes along my particular stretch of the shore have heavy corrugated metal breakwall barriers, and a few large armor rocks. My property has a concrete block wall, and a lot of armor rocks. The story goes that decades ago, after a really bad storm, everyone got together and put in the metal retainers. However, the person who owned my property was planning on moving, and thus didn’t want to spend the extra money the metal would cost, so just put up the concrete block wall reinforced with some big rocks. It was easy to do, because at that time, there was at least 50 feet of sandy beach at the foot of the properties. I can’t imagine that, since we now have water right at our feet. What changed, I wondered?

Apparently it changed when the town of Leamington installed a marina at the foot of the main street, and completely changed the flow of water and sand. Homeowners to the immediate east of me, closer to the Point Pelee peninsula, still have a few feet of beach, but nothing like it once was. In fact, I’m told the retaining walls here were initially put up to prevent wind-driven sand and not water from overwhelming the houses during a storm! The bottom line to me is that without the metal wall I have to be extra vigilant about keeping the breakwall in good shape. The wind, waves, and even the ice are constantly shifting the rocks. There’s a fellow down the road from me who is the resident expert on breakwall maintenance. He visits the homes along the north shore regularly, occasionally adding rocks, so that we all can preserve our shoreline. I added a few more this fall, and might do another load in the spring.

The process of adding armor rocks is really impressive. The rocks are transported on a flat barge, and off-loaded by one of those big ‘dinosaur’ cranes that grinds and moans, and make my cats run and hide behind the laundry basket. There’s quite an art to the whole thing. Here are a few shots of the latest load, and a view of the shore, looking east to the Pelee Tip. You can see the difference between my wall (with the decorative parapet) the neighbor’s lower, metal wall. Still in all, we are much better off than the people who live on the far side of the Pelee peninsula. The erosion damage there is much more severe, with loss of property a constant problem that has everyone scrambling for solutions. The armor stone is well-named; it does protect. Plus it makes some amazing spray when the winds blow up!

POEM : TIME / WATER / ROCK

nature’s hand-game goes on
forever in both directions
of time and space
cascade tumbling
through the meadow on
its way to making a canyon

time / water / rock
and rock, it turns out
always loses

water covers rock
water cuts rock, and
surely if slowly, time and water
will wash rock (and
everything else) away

from World of Wonders by Deborah Godin
Bayeux Arts Press, 2008

Alberta photo, Shutterstock