When The Levee Breaks

Levee: An embankment designed to prevent the flooding of a river.  -- Dictionary.com

Each spring as the snow melts and drains, rivers rise.  The further downstream you are, the more water there is, as miles and miles of tributaries feed their waters to the main river.   We hear of flooding each year.  Natural and man-made levees are supplemented with walls of sandbags, filled by volunteers who assemble to fill and place bags in attempts to save homes and businesses.

Water is cleansing and nourishing, sustaining  our lives, but it also  can be a force of destruction.   A levee can break, or breech, due to faulty design or erosion.  When it does, a trickle or torrent of water is unleashed and can leave untold amounts of damage behind after the waters recede.

In 1971, Led Zeppelin unleashed their own torrent upon the world, releasing their version of "When The Levee Breaks."  It's raw.  It's heavy.  It's the blues. 

This is an amazing song. There's a lot of emotion in here; despair, hopelessness.  Nothing you do can stop the forces at play; tremendous amounts of water, pressure and time all working against you, and as humans, we are pretty irrelevant.  There's nothing we can do, no place we can go.

To me, this song is a metaphor for our emotions, especially those of depression, sadness that wear away on us.  It was bad with me a couple years ago, when I finally snapped out of whatever trance I was in.  When I realized how bad things were, things seemed to get worse.  My feelings about myself got worse and other stresses stepped in to add to everything that was going on. 

Cryin' won't help you, prayin' won't do you no good, 

Now, cryin' won't help you, prayin' won't do you no good, 

When the levee breaks, mama, you got to move. 

I got to a point a couple days where I had cried so much, I wasn't sure I could cry any more. I physically and emotionally was worn out. All the people who said "it will feel good to cry and let it out" were lying. I certainly prayed in that time too, and ahead of it.  It seemed for naught.  Certainly the healing and reconciliation I had hoped and prayed for then didn't happen.

Eventually, the waters receded.   There was damage left behind, but I made it through.  I have my health, a great job, great friends and family, a nice house, three smart and healthy kids.  I've got a different outlook on my life and how I need to live it.

This song speaks to me of that time:  you can be down, and things might get worse, and the only thing we can do is wait it out. It's out of our control.  The waters have been set in motion miles upstream. We can cry, we can pray, but at that point in time, all you can do is get as far out of the way of the path of destruction as possible.   At least there's a great tune to listen to while you're getting out of the way.