fargo flood 09: a view from the outside 6 (nature relents)

This morning, we woke to a stunning sight. The trees are heavy with thick, wet snow, and the air is calm. This feels to me like nature’s breath of softness being lathered onto us after a difficult week. As we look out the windows, fluffy chunks of white fall intermittently from the tall birches out back, as if the snow is still coming down, which it’s not. The snowmen created by the kids yesterday afternoon have white masks over their faces, and, save those falling snow patches, the world here seems restful.

From what I could tell last night from flood updates in The Forum, the frenzied life there also has begun a retreat of sorts. Neighborhoods of evacuees are being allowed home. Drain plugs are coming out. The flood is moving from “in progress” to aftermath. The assessments of damage and recovery funding needs are in motion. A semblance of a life with which we’re familiar has returned, or at least peeked over the horizon somewhere to let us know that in time, this flood will be a memory we share with our grandchildren. “The flood of 2009, what a thing that was.”

I have several days of posts built up here, but had better take them one at a time. So I’ll start with the most recent first and move backwards from there as I am able.

Tomorrow will be taken up with reloading the van and heading back to Fargo.

This last photo of three evergreens strikes me in a particular way. They look as though they are carrying the weight of the world on their shoulders, and they well may be.