Sandbag

If you’re in the habit of using social media

and the tech on your phone to reinforce your blindspots,

reinforce your ignorance and prejudice,

you may also get in the habit of acting immune

to the actions of heedless nature and blind fortune,

against which the only effective response—not foolproof,

but the best we mortals can ever hope to do—

is offer selfless help to one another,

not hide behind a curtain of self-satisfaction.

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It can happen to you. Stop blaming others and do something constructive.

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Sandbag

The river, thick and brown, pressed against the levee, climbing inch by inch. Trucks idled with lights blazing, crews in ponchos bent over, boots sucked down by the mud. The line of bodies moved in rhythm—lift, pass, drop.

At the edge of all the activity stood the old guy everyone called Uncle in stiff jeans, a red windbreaker, and shoes not meant for muck. He was on his phone to some lodge buddy, and even now he couldn’t stop talking about freeloaders, about wasted effort, about how nothing ever changed. He laughed at some crack from the other end of the line.

The boy from next door passed with a bag against his chest. He took a deep breath and huffed, “Grab a bag or move.”

Uncle smiled, said his back was bad, said he already paid enough taxes and wasn’t about to break his back. He waved the phone at the workers filming them as if their effort were a show. The crew kept their rhythm.

Water slapped the first row of sacks. Mud crept into the seams. The boy passed again, his wet shirt clinging. Again he said, “Grab a bag or move.”

Uncle’s eyes flicked toward his porch in the distance, water already creeping onto his lawn. He shifted his weight toward the line as if ready to step in, then stopped. His hand reached for a bag’s corner, then pulled back. He laughed louder, raised the phone higher to erase the thought.

The levee groaned. A gap split, and a tongue of water rushed through. The crew shouted, turned to face it. Uncle’s lawn lay just beyond the breach. He ran forward. The phone was slipping from his grip. For a moment he tried to film, his thumb jabbing at the controls, but then the screen went black in the rain. He mashed the dead glass, as if it might come back to life.

He clutched a sack. Mud pulled his jeans down, water filled his shoes with silt. The sack slid from his arms and vanished. “Help me—my house, my place—it’s going.” His voice cracked.

The boy came past a third time. His face was hard, his words flat as judgment: “Grab a bag or move.” He did not look back.

The line bent, shoulders to the breach. Lift, pass, drop. No one turned to look at Uncle.

By dark the gap was sealed. The levee held.

Uncle stood alone on his porch, water at his knees. The boards glowed bone-white in the floodlights, and in the darkness his figure was only a shadow against them, arms hanging, no phone in sight.