Reflections - What a Difference the Rains Make

July 4, 2021 Top of Porter's Falls

My ears caught the sound of water splashing against rocks. There had to be a waterfall, but where? I scanned the woods.

On that fall day in 2019, Spence kept climbing. We followed wide bulldozer tracks along a grade so steep that I had to lean forward thirty degrees to prevent myself from tumbling backward.

Spence was studying felled trunks on our neighbor’s property across the road from Wells Wood.

I gazed at maple and oak branches stretching into the periwinkle blue sky.

A chipmunk scampered through decomposing leaves releasing an earthy-decaying fragrance that floated on the breeze along with the sound of splashing water.

Tim, a lanky Vietnam vet who lives in Michigan, vacations on this forty-five acres—hunting, fishing, and lounging in the cabin atop the hill. He’d given Spence permission to take wood left from recent logging and me permission to walk wherever I pleased. Tim hadn’t mentioned a waterfall.

Spence shifted his baseball cap. “My tractor will never get up here.”

“You could roll the firewood down the hill and load it on the road.”

His eyebrows vetoed the suggestion.

Burbling joined the splashing. Porter’s Creek hid in a gorge to my left. I veered onto a smaller path. “Let’s find the creek.”

He accepted that idea.

The path sloped gently allowing me to walk yoga-mountain-pose straight. The splashing and burbles grew louder. Rounding a fir tree, I gasped. A waterfall, huge for a runoff creek that often dries to a trickle in summer, gushed and crashed onto flat rocks. “It must be ten or twelve feet high.”

“Five,” Spence said. “Maybe six.”

“But it has two parts, and if I were standing in front of it . . .”

The words tumbled out of my mouth and onto a mental do-before-arthritis-prevents list. I would have climbed down immediately if the sides of the gorge hadn’t resembled Wile E. Coyote’s precipice. “We can walk up the creek to the falls another day and estimate how high they tower over my head.”

He inspected some chicken of the woods mushrooms. “Take your nieces. They’d be glad to go.”

Our nieces, Sarah and Laura, had waded in Deer Creek at the bottom of the hill since they were toddlers. Grown now, and both teaching industrial arts, they could easily manage a hike up Porter’s runoff creek as well as offer a hand to me for tricky parts. I would ask them during the next Wells family get-together. A practical plan, but due to cold weather then the pandemic, I had to wait seven seasons to put it into action

Finally, on July Fourth, a quiet contingent of the Wells gang visited—Spence’s brother Bruce, his wife Cindy, and their oldest, Sarah. I waited another fifteen minutes while Sarah and Cindy shared their Mount Hope Horse Show adventures before I proposed a walk. “We can hunt for flowers around Wells Wood.” That would take us across fields and along Deer Creek’s floodplain. “We could walk on the road to North Road bridge.” They’d done both these walks before. “Or we could try something new and hike up Porter’s Creek to the waterfall.” I hoped they would choose the waterfall.

No one did. 

Bruce shifted his walking sticks, which resemble ski poles. “I can’t walk that far.” He rubbed his hip. “Not today.” 

Spence fetched the tongs. “I have to grill the turkey burgers and kielbasa.”

Sarah shrugged. “Any is fine with me.”

Cindy agreed with Sarah. 

“The waterfall it is!” I pumped my fists. “Do you need creek shoes?”

Cindy did, but Sarah said she’d wear her sandals. That sounded dangerous, but she’s an agile, accomplished horsewoman and more sturdy than me. I didn’t protest. Much.

I hustled down the spiral stairs to fetch old tennis shoes. The box of creek shoes had sat by the central basement pillar since 2006. A mountain of empty Amazon boxes covered the spot and surrounded the pillar. I tossed them away one by one, entertaining top cat Ande but not uncovering the shoes.

Spence had cleaned the basement recently. Maybe he’d moved them. I checked his plant table, the storage shelves, the workbench, the cold cellar, and the bathroom. No shoes.

Walking in bare feet would hurt, and I didn’t want to ruin my only pair of in-tact tennis shoes. Had my waterfall adventure dried up? I climbed back to the porch with the bad news.

Cindy jumped off the love seat. “I probably have some in the car.”

“You must have something in your closet,” Spence said.

Searching the closet, I found a pair of fake crocs. I pulled on a pair of old socks to prevent blisters and slipped into the plastic shoes.

Sarah, Cindy, and I set off. Slowly.

The road gravel poked and pressed against the thin plastic pricking my tender soles. I limped but didn’t turn back. Stepping into the creek brought relief. The cool water soothed the poked-parts, and the rocks—cantaloupe-size and larger—didn’t jab. A couple of storms the week before had replenished the summer flow and created pools ankle to calf deep, the perfect depth for a safe hike.

With Sarah in the lead, we dodged jumbles of rocks, ducked under or leg-lifted over logs, and traipsed onto the bank to avoid multiple-tree-part entanglements. I reached for Sarah’s hand to steady my step onto knee-high boulders.

Leaves rustled overhead. Chipmunks chattered.

Half way up, the creek bed changed. Flat sheets of bedrock covered with moss made the hike like walking up a gradual, carpeted staircase. Evidently, water had washed all the smaller rocks to the lower section.

We climbed and climbed and climbed. Gurgling changed to splashing. After a few more bedrock rises, we found the first of three falls. Shop teacher Sarah confirmed my estimates. The bottom falls were two feet high. Ten yards further, a three-foot falls gushed at the base of the main seven-foot falls. Water sparkled.

Pulling cell phones out of pockets, we stepped around each other taking photos until Sarah said, “I’m going to be a mountain goat.” She stuffed her phone in a pocket, climbed rocks that didn’t appear to have toeholds, and scrambled to the top before either Cindy or I had time to worry. Sarah stepped on a rock ledge to the side of the stream, crouched, and aimed her camera. 

Sarah Atop Porter's Falls

Imagining photos from that angle, I admired her athleticism—not enough to climb like a mountain goat. I contented myself taking Sarah’s photo on the ledge made from slabs of protruding bedrock.

Cindy didn’t admire the photo angle. “Sarah, the rock could break.”

Sarah took a few more photos.

“There’s no support under it, Sarah.”

Sarah backed off the ledge. “I don’t want you to worry.” She eased herself to the foot of the falls, and we waded down the mossy, bedrock slabs. When the creek bed turned into its rock obstacle course, we followed a rutted logging path then Tim’s driveway to the road.

Proud and content, I mentally crossed the waterfall trek off the before-arthritis-prevents list. 

Then it rained.

Rain hammered the metal roof, and wind thrashed trees for seven of the next ten days. As if Wells Wood weren’t soggy enough, torrential downpours fell for three additional days. The storms peaked Friday evening, July 16. Lightning flattened Rills’s ears. Thunder arched Ande’s back. Flickering lights sent Gilbert under the sofa.

When the storm paused Saturday morning, Spence and I pulled on boots and went out to explore. Water trickled, burbled, and rushed. Culverts had overflowed and washed debris across the dirt road. Deer Creek morphed into a muddy menace. It surged, roared, and spilled into three runoff streams on the flood plain.

We climbed the squishy path out of the valley and dodged water running out of the catchment basin, through the garden, then down the creek path. If the rains had changed the fields and floodplain so much, what had it done to Tim’s waterfall? I put the waterfall trek back on my list. “Let's walk up the hill and check Porter’s Falls.”

Spence tipped his baseball cap at me. “I’m following you.”

We took the logging path up Tim’s hill. Though I couldn’t detect the sound of water splashing on rocks because water gurgled and swished everywhere, I knew the way.

Rounding the fir tree, I gasped. White water cascaded and dashed against stones with a resounding shshshshshsh. Maybe I could perch where Sarah had.

Holding onto saplings, I baby-stepped closer to the stream above the falls.

“That tree’s dead,” Spence called. “It won’t support you.”

Dead? I raised my arm, and the tree lifted out of the ground. Dropping it, I crept over squishy leaves and slick mud.

“The ground’s slippery.”

Spence didn’t need to tell me that. I stepped onto the mossy rock atop the falls and inched forward to get Sarah’s view.

“Vertigo, Janet.” Spence’s voice boomed over the rushing water. “Watch your vertigo.”

He had a point. If I got dizzy and toppled in, being swooshing down the creek would be painful—if not worse. I inched backward. Mission accomplished. I could take the waterfalls off my list for good this time, except . . . in winter, the waterfall might form a silent ice sculpture. Hmmm.

7-17-21 Porter's Falls