It’s Breakup Season; the time that all the ice and snow melts and we are balls deep in mud out here in The Hills. The last three years have been easy Breakups, without large sinkholes that will swallow a car. This year we are not so lucky. There are two parts of our “road” out that are absolute soup, and I have to park the car a little ways up the road and bring supplies down with the cargo sled until things dry out a bit more.
But it’s not all bad. There is something very satisfying about making little channels to drain the water. It’s kind of like my Zen garden, except instead of a rake, I wield a shovel.
Besides, I’m half Dutch, so water management is in my blood. The water doesn’t always go exactly where you want it to, but that’s ok. It’s a very meditative process.
One of the first things we did after buying the property (and suffering an absolutely horrific Breakup after our first Winter here), was have a driveway drain put in. I honestly don’t know how the people who lived here before we did managed without that driveway drain. All the water draining down from both sides of the property gathered in a giant pool at the end of the driveway before the drain was put in. Now it all flows neatly down the hill, needing only the occasional mucking out and removal of debris to keep things flowing.
I also had to muck out a culvert today that diverts water from up on the hill down the cliff side.
Fingers crossed for another week of sunshine, which hopefully will dry the “road” out enough for me to smooth it out with the tractor.
