Above the Dam

© Barry Pomeroy

I felt the splash upon my face before I was fully aware of its origin. When I sat up in the late morning and saw the dark spots on my blanket and then the falling drops, I realized that the rain the land desperately needed had finally come. The towering nimbus clouds indicated that the shower would probably be local, but since that observation would not save me from being dampened when it passed, I began to think about shelter. I was near the shore and the only houses I saw were hundreds of yards off, a distance that lengthened in the darkened sky and sudden mist of the shower. I stowed my blanket and poncho under the piece of the barn door and pushed towards land with my paddle. The shore was further away than I had thought, so I was soaked and shivering when I arrived. After securing my raft with rope, I went inland to a large, leaning spruce tree and chewed its gum while I hid from the rain in its shadow. The squall took some hours to pass, but when it did, I determined to make a dwelling on my raft for such contingencies. Accordingly, I collected sticks and made a roof of them—none too securely, I'm afraid—in order to have a low shelter I could creep under to avoid the heavier showers.

When I thrust the raft back out into the late afternoon current, at least what there was of a current now, I couldn't help but smile. My raft resembled that of Huckleberry Finn and Jim. I had inadvertently mimicked their low, peaked hut. Standing on one end of my fine craft, I could have passed for the ragged Huck that illustrators were prone to draw in the children's versions of the book. The rain came in scattered showers and the light, gusty wind was still in the west, so I gradually slipped by the land until afternoon brought me into another broad gulf. I was just starting to think that this river was merely interconnected lakes, when I saw that the other supposed lake was an inlet. Similar to the place where I had slipped by the town, this section signified a meeting of two waters. At its lower end I saw where the water abruptly ended and, after peering for some time under the cloudy day, I identified the low housing of a hydroelectric dam. I knew that a dam existed on this river, and although the slowness of the current had aroused my suspicions, I wasn't sure that the dam was downstream. I knew this area poorly. I felt a sudden fear of being swept into the giant turbines that robotically whirred in order to provide light and electric heat for thousands of homes, but the infrequent wind shifted my raft over to the southern side of the river and momentarily allayed that fear. I fastened my craft to the shore near the highway that sped over the top of the dam. I was too far below their sight to be seen by the people in the vehicles, and as the dark closed about me, I built my fire. Sitting there in the gloom around my fire, the sky black and cloudy with sudden gusts of heavy rain, I couldn't help but think, once I realized that this area was flooded, of the stories I had heard of the preparation required for the coming dam.

When the dam was built the engineers had hired thousands of Dans to clear the forested banks, relocate the willing or recalcitrant home owners and their farm equipment, and burn such buildings that might float into the turbines once the valley was filled. Hundreds of acres of trees were cut and burned; even the slow burning cedar were piled onto each other until they smouldered into ash. Heavier things were left where they stood, of course—such as the elm trunks, whose wood was heavy with sap and would only wash slowly to the shore—except the graveyards, which were moved stone by stone. The engraved stones were transferred to higher land for sentimental reasons, I suppose, although the real horror of having your family drowned deep was not mitigated by having the headstone upon dry land. I had heard that occasionally a bone washed up upon the gravel of the new bank, but had never seen one. When the teller was questioned they retreated behind dark vague statements about bodies buried deep below the river's surface. Whenever I heard the stories as a child, it was not the drowned bodies that concerned me, but rather I saw the stone houses with their open windows where beds were still laid with sheets for guests. I saw benches floating in the vacant rooms and eels and fish passing where once a hand had grasped a windowsill or laid a fire in a cold dark hearth. I saw mouldering trucks sitting in drowned yards and the ancient river valley train tracks, which are still there, they say, far below the surface, waiting for the harsh whistle of a train that will never come. As I drifted over these images of the past forever stilled and preserved in the depths, I saw the import of the tops of small bridges on the older road that followed the river. Where the hills sprawled out into the new lake, the road plunged into the depths. I suddenly envisioned the night that some unwary motorist might suddenly, horrifyingly, see water where there should be pavement. Too late they would realize they had turned off the new broad highway and were winding down the twisted road that led to the submerged villages.

When the dam was finished and the river diverted back into its natural channel, the engineers stood on the bank with the locals who had helped the project for their pennies a day and watched it fill. They saw the water rush down the deserted drives and capture the rusting rail tracks, drown the houses and farms, and even as they stood they saw, terribly, the thousands of animals who did not receive notice they were to be displaced. With no one to come to their door and indicate faraway city plans, and forms for compensation, the animals came in a huge rush up the bank. The high-flying birds saw the water first and gave the alarm, all animosities forgotten in the general fear, and then larger mammals and insects made for the new bank, terror burning into their backs. They didn't dare look behind them at the impossibly rising stream. They fled and every high land they reached was not high enough, until finally it was. Some were stranded on islands and spent their final hours in horror. Even while the people on the shore looked on in wonder and pride at their accomplishment, those trapped stood, and when the water closed about their bodies, tried too late to swim. That macabre flotsam was forgotten, and they swirled in the river trash; those on the bank congratulated themselves, giving themselves to pride while others drowned.

Some stood in resentment and swore revenge. Tall moose remembered drowned meadows and swamps, and the frogs sat in row along the bank looking into the depths until they finally turned to cross the hills. Others sat in smoky bars and talked about how their land had been in the family for generations. The family creek and the field their grandfather had cleared that, inexplicably, they still called the new field, were all drowned for a few dollars easily drunk. And they swore revenge. They told of nights that they knew would never come, of taking dynamite and creeping to the dam's edge, where they would theatrically pause, and drop their homemade bomb hissing into the intake for the turbines. It would open the concrete and earth dam in one burst. That easily taken money would be poured back into the public coffers, and they'd return to their land where they'd been forced away.

Meanwhile, the dam filled, all animals were driven from their homes, and some were paid for their trouble. The mercury-laden silt filled the farmhouses and covered the tractor standing in the hayfield where the hay would never dry, blanketed the rusty train tracks and the roads, and settled into the front seat of the truck, moulded around the gearshift and covered the pedals on the floor.

The sky was still washed with cloud when I woke to the sounds of traffic on the causeway across the dam. I knew I would have to abandon my raft and, when I sat upright, that was the first thought in my mind. As I washed, hanging over the end of the raft, I looked again at its architecture. I was faintly proud of myself, for I had little material when I made it, but the logs had held together, though some of the twine was fraying. I noticed that the larger logs were coming a bit loose from their crosspieces, but it had served me well. I couldn't take the raft with me over the dam, of course, so I would have to strip from it whatever I could use—which would be my paddle and twine—and trust to finding materials on the other side to make another.