Manic Frustration “If I do not write to empty my mind, I go mad.” ~Lord Byron

It's been a long, stressful, busy and, most of all, wet month(s). On the surface, in Tunkhannock, everything seems back to normal since the flood. The roads are clean and clear of mud and people go about their normal business.

Look closer.

Brick's Market is "Closed until further notice". There's still a drooping barrier of caution tape strung across the parking lot of Gay's True Value. In small corners, I find caked mud. Stains of oil. Ghosts of the flood remain on stalks of corn and trees in pale shadows left by the water.


While driving around, I've felt I've been sailing. Waterfalls are still pouring down the side of Avery Mountain and the Susquehanna runs muddy and high along its banks. Route 92 was closed for a second time just last week.

The weather sways like an erratic pendulum taunting me with shining, beautiful days only to pull blankets of dark, miserable clouds across the sky dumping sheets of rain down over hills and across my face.

Leaves are beginning to change and fall, covering my lawn in speckles of reds and yellows. I find myself closing my window at night to keep the chill out and, in the morning, it's harder to leave the comfort of my blankets. Even the sun finds it hard to come out. I smell winter coming.

Jack, my niece's horse who stands quietly behind the weathered wood of the old barn, will grow thick with a winter coat. Snow will fall, clinging to the lashes around his dark eyes. His breath will billow out in gentle clouds around his snout.

Watch the trees grow naked. Feel the crisp retreat of another summer. Another year. Unpack the jackets and mittens and store away the memories created in the passing months. Pick pumpkins from the field and cut character into their face while you drown in cider. This is the winding down of time.

The deep slumber of the land is coming. The hollow winds of winter. Blank canvases of land lit by the moon and pinpoint stars.

Another year is just beyond the banks of snow to come. All is reborn when the last bits of ice melt away and hearts begin to beat faster.

Rt. 92 South of Tunkhannock. Sept. 8th, 2011.

Thursday morning, I woke up to the constant sound of rain against pavement. The same white noise I had fallen asleep to. On Wednesday, people were talking about flooding. Serious flooding. Irene had just slipped through causing damage all over NYC, New Jersey and portions of Eastern Pennsylvania. A few small towns around me had been severely flooded by their small streams.

With the ground saturated and the skies pouring oceans of water over northeastern Pennsylvania and southern New York, we began to see the streams and creeks, something Pennsylvania has an abundance of, rise and spill into each other until finally feeding into the Susquehanna. The way things were shaping up in the storm system and the rapid rising of the waters, it was beginning to look serious. Hushed whispers of a tragedy not seen since 1972 filled the voices of many.

While my coffee brewed, I watched the news outline what was happening. Binghamton, NY had received ten inches of rain in approximately two days. A fact that was repeated over and over by meteorologists on the local news. Three months of rain in such a short time. Towns upstream from Tunkhannock like Meshoppen, Towanda and Wyalusing were already experiencing major flooding.

I called my boss to find out what was happening in town. He and other employees were moving equipment from the shop to higher ground. There was already a foot of water in the building. New comments began to saturate the news coverage: "Worse than Agnes." "Record crest for the Susquehanna." We were in for a disaster the likes of which I had only heard stories.

The Susquehanna swallows Tunkhannock.

When I finished my coffee, I decided I'd walk to town since all road travel was being discouraged. There were actually rumors of $500 fines for those caught driving. As I made my way down the road, I could hear the roaring of the Susquehanna over the hill. I had never heard it this loud in all of my years spent in Tunkhannock. There had been plenty of floods that I had lived through, but this was a new beast and the river roared.

The muddy water was already lapping the banks just over the edge of route 92 and, around the corner, as the road dipped down along the edge of the mountain, the river had already crawled up and over the pavement. There was no way I'd make it to town on foot.

My father and I decided that, since we were seemingly trapped between two flood plains, we'd hike Avery Mountain and look out over the valley from Hangman's, an area near the top of the mountain where hang-gliders launch. Hiking up, the waters spilled down across rocks and ledges, mixing into a slippery, muddy mess. Fog rolled through the trees thick and heavy and the humidity made our trip more difficult than it should have been.

As we reached the top, the picture below us was beyond anything I had ever seen. The river had swelled and spread across the valley, engulfing and swallowing everything within its path. Houses and buildings lay surrounded by its muddy waters and round-bales of hay, that once sat in fields undisturbed, began floating downstream.

Slowly, other people began to join us at the top of the mountain to watch as our town was inundated with the rising Susquehanna. While we all stood and watched, each of us remarking on the unfolding destruction, a woman spotted something floating down the river. It was large and moving fast. I heard someone ask, "Is that a house?"

A house floats down the Susquehanna.

Lifting my camera, I focused the lens and zoomed in, finding the object in the rushing water. There, floating along like a toy, two windows were visible. A sharp-angled, green roof. It was surreal, but it was happening right before my eyes. My father had told me stories about the flood of Agnes in 1972 when he and his friends stood on the old, metal bridge and watched as house after house floated down and splintered into nothing against the heavy steel girders.

People on the bridge watched as the house floated closer and closer to the river bridge, colliding into the side and splintering, almost exploding, into a floating pile of rubble. The sound was so intense that we could hear it at the top of the mountain. This was only the beginning.

Downtown Tunkhannock as the waters rose quickly.

Property of Dale R Wilsey Jr.

It's not that I don't enjoy the rain. But I've spent enough time indoors for now and I've felt stifled. It's hard to write sitting inside. What I crave is a walk through the woods. A hike to the top of the mountain to gaze out over the valley and watch the Susquehanna wind its way through town.

Maybe a trip to Rickett's Glen or a cruise out to the Pennsylvania Grand Canyon on the bike. Set up camp. Spark a fire and sit roasting my meal over an open flame. Sometimes, I believe I would have been more at home in this world when the major mode of transportation was fueled by grains, hay and the occasional sip from a trickling stream or still pond.

I haven't ridden in years, though. How would I take to sitting my ass back in a saddle after all this time? Maybe it's like riding a bike. Maybe you never forget. Just like jumping onto my motorcycle and firing it up for the first time after a long winter. A few moments and everything is the way it should be. At least I'd be able to ride a horse through the winter. I can only imagine how beautiful a ride through the hills would be as the snow drifted down among the pines and speckled the stallion's mane.

And here I sit. Rambling on as thoughts come drifting through my head. Daydreams. Images and ideas. Products of another rainy day stuck inside. Here I thought the words wouldn't come as easily. I know they're always there. I've just got to open the door more often.

Let the rain come in through the screen in my window. Walk outside. Let it wash down over me. Warm, summer rains. Those are the kinds of rains you can enjoy. Listen to the thunder rumble off over the hills as it splatters the pavement in with its soothing, white noise.