Broken Dam

The waters had been held back since 1938. A project of the Public Works Administration. Beneath the new dam, homes, stores, and schools were built. There were parks with newly planted trees and benches named after ninety-year-olds. “Dedicated to Medardus”. There was a library that was small but contained three different editions of The Waves.

I was a high diver. One of the best in the country and easily the best in St. Winnoc. Ninety-five feet off the ground, the industry standard. Mom and Dad called me an adrenaline junkie. Every moment of the dive was a joy. The anticipation at the top. The flip just below the board. The brief moment of sheer verticality falling into the water. The water racing past your body as you pierce into its space. Splash. It was the moment of verticality that held the most important key to diving’s secret beauty. To me, all of life took place in that split second. That second is the movement of the ball after it has been pushed. In that moment, the ego comes up against the immovable force of fate. The water below is an inevitability.

The newspapers would call it government incompetence—the kind of plainly obvious fact that becomes a headline these days. The issues were obvious, the solution was obvious, the money was available. It just never happened. The dam was not an exemplar of American ingenuity, like many others were. The river was a minor one and the project came near the end of the funding cycle. The existence of the dam in the first place was pointless. The water should have kept flowing. Another example of the government ignoring what it should do in favor of something no one asked for, said one later historian. The town itself was nothing special. The high school baseball team won a few championships. The diner in the town center was once visited by obscure sixties teen idol Jimmy Elledge, best known for his cover of “Funny How Time Slips Away”. His photo could be found framed just outside the women’s bathroom. A local eighth grader’s poem became briefly famous for being mistakenly attributed as a rediscovered Charles Bukowski work. It was a place that merely existed in the in-between. But so did everything else, countered another historian.

The inevitability of the water was always on my mind. It was oddly freeing. The burden of responsibility lifted off my shoulders. The water was always just below. There was nothing I could do. My boss no longer got to me. Relationships came and went occasionally without real attachment. I never cried—not when my 3DS or my dog or my grandparents died. I let it all slip off me and hit the water. I could live my life whichever way pleased me. I jumped the day I was born. The water was inevitable. 

At 6:12 am on the Feast of St. Adjutor, a woman woke up in a cold sweat. A terrible nightmare. She imagined herself landing in the pool and then being trapped there. It was like the surface no longer existed the moment she hit the water. Her room felt damp. The walls seemed to be covered in condensation. She went back to sleep.

My last diving competition was different. For the first time in years, I felt doubt and stood completely frozen on the board. A foreign thought had entered my mind. Should I take the jump? It kept repeating in my head. I remembered a dream I had the night before. I was afraid of the water for the first time since preschool. My eyes began to well up as they peered below into the water. Tears started to stream down my face as I turned away from the jump. My coach stared at me from below. I noticed the coldness of the steel ladder more than before as I climbed down. This thought ventured from a submerged place deep within me. A place that had been enveloped by the waves of time long ago. A dam had broken, and the weight of the world came crashing down upon me. That place, where the hesitation rested, has re-emerged. I wondered if I had made the first real choice of my life. I should have been a different person. I will be a different person. Like a whole world had suddenly popped into existence, a thousand lives stood before me. The water was still. It was no longer inevitable. I breathed in the possibility. Everyone was grinning at me.

At 6:17 am on the Feast of St. Adjutor, the town ceased to exist. There was not a single survivor, with the exception of a few residents who were away at the time. The state government attempted a recovery operation for salvageable property and bodies. The remains of the dam were demolished. A new one was not built, primarily due to funding being diverted to an armed war on poverty. After enough time, historians, archeologists, and divers would become regular tourists. When the place had been picked apart, it was stocked with fish. Freshwater fishing enthusiasts would and continue to spend lazy weekends there. The place beneath became a footnote of natural disaster and government malpractice history. An under-maintained stone memorial sits next to the tackle shop. Some visit the lake without even knowing there was a town underneath.

The Lake Saint Winnoc Bait & Tackle Shop is open Mondays through Saturdays from 9 am to 6 pm. Berkley plastic baits are 25% off through April 30th. Kids under age twelve can rent a fishing rod for only $5. Bring your pontoon boat rental receipt to the store and receive a free bag of minnows. Beginner fishing rod lessons are held every Saturday at 11 am. “It is never too late to try a new hobby!”