Water is life!

There’s a “wet spot” at the foot of the slope in the yard behind the house. Most springs it looks something like the picture below. Notice there’s still snow cover but there’s also an obvious pool of water. So far this year there’s no sign of a pool developing. I think it has something to do with the extended drought Minnesota has been experiencing up until this winter.

backyard wet spot in late March

Photo by J. Harrington

The pool appears to be groundwater-based. I think the lack of surface water is because the groundwater had dropped a lot and not been replenished when winter set in. This morning the mud and puddles at the east end of the driveway were gone. Evaporation and/or seeping into the soil probably accounts for most of the disappearance. What little was left froze overnight. Midday today the mud and puddles are back. I’m not a hydrologist but I am suspicious that we won’t see our wet spot until the groundwater has been replenished in our neighborhood. Remember the old song about "Dem Bones" (also called "Dry Bones" and "Dem Dry Bones”)?

Verse 1
Toe bone connected to the foot bone
Foot bone connected to the heel bone
Heel bone connected to the ankle bone
Ankle bone connected to the leg bone
Leg bone connected to the knee bone
Knee bone connected to the thigh bone
Thigh bone connected to the hip bone
Hip bone connected to the back bone
Back bone connected to the shoulder bone
Shoulder bone connected to the neck bone
Neck bone connected to the head bone
Hear the word of the Lord.

The hydrologic cycle works pretty much that way except where we’ve made a mess of it. Atmospheric water falls as rain or snow, runs off or sinks in and what doesn’t re-evaporate flows eventually back into the oceans where the cycle restarts. The pollution we discharge into the air or local rivers gets conveyed to the ocean or precipitates from the atmosphere. Remember acid rain? It’s still falls and is now accompanied by PFAS. Except for sunlight, our Earth is pretty much a closed system. There is no “away.” 

Wind, Water, Stone

By Octavio Paz
Translated by Eliot Weinberger

for Roger Caillois

Water hollows stone,

wind scatters water,

stone stops the wind.

Water, wind, stone.

Wind carves stone,

stone's a cup of water,

water escapes and is wind.

Stone, wind, water.

Wind sings in its whirling,

water murmurs going by,

unmoving stone keeps still.

Wind, water, stone.

Each is another and no other:

crossing and vanishing

through their empty names:

water, stone, wind.

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