She's all swole up, y'all!

… and Remembrances of Floods Past …

“Gotcha wadin’ boots on?” Tricycle Man asked me the minute I stepped onto the Riverwalk this morning. “Yep!” I lied – ‘cause of course I was sportin’ my trusty Asics Gels. It occurred to me as I wrote that sentence that I never give Tricycle Man a straight answer. But that’s okay, ‘cause he neither wants nor expects one.

But back to The River. She’s over the Riverwalk north of Dillingham Street Bridge, to the Eagle and Phenix Powerhouse – and I don’t know where else. Fred took some photos yesterday afternoon:



Many thanks to my very sweet (and very smart!) niece, who shall remain nameless here, and who works at TSYS, and who yesterday afternoon sent me this note:

Hi, Aunt Cathy--

TSYS issued a warning to us today to avoid the Riverwalk near the downtown TSYS campus -- apparently, the water levels are high and officials with Georgia Power will be opening additional locks on dams this afternoon. I just wanted to share with you and tell you to be safe and careful if you take any walks over the next couple of days!

Have a good Tuesday.

C.

Thanks much, C. I really do appreciate the information – and I appreciate your reading my blog!

Tricycle Man and I spent a few minutes reminiscing about floods past, and he recalled one time back about ’93 when “the water came all the way up to about halfway up that statue down there,” as he pointed to the Christopher Columbus sculpture. And most of us who’ve been paying much attention to the Riverwalk over the years remember that parts of it have been underwater several times since it opened in 1992 – and that’s okay – ‘cause it’s designed to withstand flooding.

I remember once about, well, it must have been about ’86 or so ‘cause Jake was born in ’81 and he was five or six years old, when the River came all the way up onto the seats at the Promenade Amphitheatre.

And I also remember once when I was a little kid – uh, that would have been in the 50s – when the River actually came out of her banks and flooded some streets in downtown Columbus. My family didn’t live in Columbus, but from our perch on a hill in nearby Marion County we saw pictures on television and in the newspaper.

My totally uninformed opinion is that the River is not going to flood anywhere near that much this time around, but ya never know, so I’m thinkin’ about followin’ Tricycle Man’s advice and investin’ in some wadin’ boots.

Changes and Surfaces

Changes

Just yesterday Tricycle Man commented, “The River’s ‘bout full, ain’t it?” While I voiced white lie agreement with him, I silently disagreed, since visual evidence actually indicated that the water level was down about two feet from where it had been during the night, and the Chattahoochee was a fur piece from spilling her banks.

Like Tricycle Man, the first thing most casual visitors to the River notice, I think, is the depth. But the depth of the River has become less interesting to me than other factors – color, clarity, and, especially, the way the surface looks.

I never cease to be amazed at how different the River appears from day to day – and sometimes even from hour to hour. Here in Columbus, the Chattahochee really is a river of many personalities. Most mornings she’s relatively low, clear, still and smooth as glass. Reflections are so sharp that sometimes it’s hard to distinguish a reflection from the thing reflected. Then, by late afternoon, the water level is up a couple or so feet and the current is swift, with swirls and eddies decorating the surface. Reflections become blurred past distinction. Most of the time the water is a clear dark brown, and I can see to the bottom for a distance of yards and yards out from the bank; but after a rain the water becomes a cloudy yellow-red, and visibility is limited to the surface.





Surfaces

My walks along the River have led me to an obsession with surfaces. There’s the surface of the River, which changes with the current, with the wind, with the weather. There’s the surface of the RiverWALK, which changes from asphalt to concrete to brick, depending on where you are on the stretch. There’s the surface of the Riverbank, which right now is pretty much dominated by kudzu.

And what do surfaces do? We all know the answer to that question. They conceal. They conceal what lies beneath.

And what’s beneath that kudzu? What’s beneath that asphalt? What’s beneath the surface of the River herself? What’s beneath the skin of that human being who just pedaled by?

What’s beneath the kudzu we’ll soon see, as fall brings frost and death to kudzu till next spring. What’s beneath the Riverwalk is a giant sewer, not so hard to imagine. What’s beneath the surface of the River herself? Very interesting to contemplate, but I’ll leave that to those SCUBA divers and to “the boy who could draw the bottom.” What lies beneath the skin of that human? Well, therein lies the real mystery. And I’m intrigued. Think I’ll go read me some Flannery O’Connor, or some Carson McCullers, or some William Faulkner, or some … or maybe tomorrow I’ll take the time to have a longer conversation with Tricycle Man.

THE BEST REMAINDERING OF THEM ALL! (Cathy gets trumped.)

Okay, I know when I'm trumped, and I've gotta give credit. Fred found and photographed this, the best remaindering of them all:



Title: "Two Men Up Under the Dillingham Street Bridge"

The Boy Who Could Draw the Bottom -- and more Remainderings

A few days ago, as I was walking downriver, right south of the Dillingham Street Bridge, I first heard and then saw a speedboat flyin’ up the River, toward the Eagle and Phenix Dam, going about … I don’t know … How fast do speedboats go? Anyway, this guy was steppin’ ON it. I thought to myself, I hope he knows where the channel is. He must have, ‘cause he got on outta my sight and I didn’t hear any loud crash. All those rocks … yikes.

Once, years ago, I had a student, a ninth-grade boy, who could draw, in detail, the bottom of the river, with all its elevations, from Eagle and Phenix Dam down past Rotary Park. And he might have been able to draw more – the portion I just described is what I saw him draw. He explained that ever since he was a little bitty kid he’d spent lots of time fishing with his granddaddy out on this portion of the River, from his granddaddy’s boat. He said that his granddaddy would carefully explain all the “suckholes” and rocks and ups and downs and structural remnants and piles of debris on the bottom of the River – and that they spent time on the River when it was high and when it was low and when it was in between. That boy loved the River. I’m pretty sure he loved his granddaddy, too. Was my student’s drawing accurate? Hell if I know, but he surely did seem to know what he was drawin’ about.

Switchin' topics, here are some recently snagged remainderings, including both a few visual ones as well as a coupla audials:


That's a MUSHROOM growing on the bank of the River! (It's been HUMID 'round heah lately.)







It occurred to me after a while that my whole beloved Powerhouse is a remaindering -- unto itself.





And the audial:

One woman cyclist to another: "And, ya know, you have to know all the little TEENY words to put in there."
The other cyclist: "Right!"

***

One male cyclist to the whole flock of cyclists behind him, as he points to the "west bank" -- "No! That's PHENIX CITY!"