Messing about in the river

What better to do on an Easter weekend than mess about in the river? What else is there to do on a day when everything is closed but indulge in childish pasttimes? To indulge in messing about 'in' the river and not 'on' it as Kenneth Grahame wrote so eloquently in 'The Wind In The Willows'. One river dammed (the Gwendraeth Fawr) makes for one thoroughly enjoyable childish pasttime along with some general splashing.

Easter is a thoroughly confounding holiday for the non-religious; A long weekend with enough attached religious content to cause squeamishness in the taking advantage of it. It is tricky, especially as so many things close down, just like the equally awkward Christmas. It's also a religious holiday imposed universally, which is a problem all of it's own. But politics can be laid aside, as they're quite redundant next to messing about on rivers.

Oh, to mess about on rivers, splashing merrily away. There are so many ways to just be happy with a river. You can boat, just like in 'Three Men In A Boat' (2015 summer plan), you can walk merrily alongside, build dams, listen to the tinkling sound of the water, race rubber ducks and model boats, or just paddle along barefoot thinking happy thoughts. Rivers are lovely when they're small enough to be credible and not so massive as to be used industrially. The Danube, for example, gave no feeling of fun at all, as it was so massive as to be more a barrier than anything else, and an artery for shipping as well. It wasn't something you could have fun with somehow. Rivers are better small.

It would be far nicer to be mucking about on the river, instead of working stubbornly and trying to generate enough pre-planned Quirky Muffins to keep it going through the upcoming conferences and holidays as close to normal as possible. There are only so many meaningful and influential books and films in anyone's history! If a deluge of story episodes lands, you can rest assured that all else failed, and a massive serialisation session occurred ten minutes before departure. IT will all get back to normal in about a month, so rest assured, theoretical and deranged reader. There will be more stories than anyone can shake a stick at, extending infinitely into the blogging horizon. Perhaps everyone should go and mess about in rivers instead? Or at least canals?

Damming a little river is fun, when you have the rocks around to improvise. It has been done so many times on our little village river that you're always building on the remains of previous attempts in any case. You build and build, and the water rises and overflows at the sides, so you extend sideways and the water rises again to go over the top. It's a neverending process, and lovely. No matter how high you go, there is always more to do, and it will mostly topple at the next surge anyway.

These are the things life is made of,
O.