Just get it started . . . Thank you Dad.

In the spring, when we had all that rain, the front field flooded. I had to grab the rusted spade out of the drive shed and walk down to the shore to open the culvert that ran from the field, under the old road, and out into Lake Ontario.
The old road is the old road because the road used to run down along the shore but it kept washing out so they moved it. That was well before I was born and you can hardly tell it had ever had been a road now, it’s so grown over; but when I was growing up we always called it the old road—so that’s what it is.
Anyway, we’d had quite a few storms and the lake got awful rough in them and when she gets in one of her moods she’ll throw great heaping handfuls of rocks and pebbles up onto the land like it'd done her wrong. The culvert was covered. I couldn’t see it for stones. I reckoned that it was going to take me damn near forever to clear it out with that old spade.
I shook my head and walked to the other side of the old road, found the culvert and then followed it back so I could get a rough idea of where I should start digging.
It wasn’t that helpful.
I stood and stared at that limestone; all those smooth, round, pebbles and rocks piled right up to the old road.
Then I remembered what my Dad had told me,
“You don't have to do it all. Just get it started and nature will do the rest.”
I stepped onto the shore and went down below where the culvert should be. There was a little bit of water coming out from the rocks, and that’s where I started digging.
It didn’t take much before the water from the field was pushing strong enough that all I had to do was stand back and let it come.
Every once and while I’d pull a few rocks out of the way, but for the most part, I let the path clear itself.
As I watched the mini rapids running and the little river widened, I kept thinking,
“Just get it started and nature will do the rest.”
What a great piece of wisdom to pass on.
Thank you Dad.

Copyright © Colin Frizzell 2009. All rights reserved.