The Year Money Grew on Trees (13 page)

"Got to make a little dam for the water," said Brother Brown, gesturing toward the tarp.

He adjusted the tarp and then waited until the water level had raised to about half the ditch's height.

"You know about siphoning?" he asked, looking at me. He gestured to some aluminum pipes lying on the ground.

My face grimaced and my stomach began to hurt. He didn't expect me to start sucking ditch water through those pipes, did he? "Yes," I said nervously.

"Grab a few of those pipes and get 'em going," he said sharply.

I picked up the nearest pipe and put one end in the ditch. I reluctantly knelt down on the ground and put my lips on the other end, ready to suck.

"No, no, not like that," snapped Brother Brown. He grabbed the pipe from me and shook his head. He put one end in the ditch and covered the other with his hand and then moved the pipe back and forth two times. Water poured out of one end, and he dropped it on the ground so it filled a small ditch dug parallel to one of the rows of trees.

"What did you do? Can you show us again?" I asked, as if begging him to reveal a magic trick.

He grabbed another pipe and moved a little slower this time. "Keep covering the one end while you push it into the ditch. Uncover it when you pull out," he said as he rocked the pipe back and forth. In a few motions, water came spurting out and he laid the pipe on the ground.

"Need three pipes on each side of every row," he said as he moved to grab more pipes.

"Okay, let me give it a try," I said, turning to the others.

I grabbed a pipe and worked frantically to start it siphoning. No matter how fast or how slow I tried, nothing seemed to happen.

"You're not doing your hands right," said Lisa.

I looked from face to face. Brother Brown was already a few rows away, leaving us behind. I looked at Amy, who had a calm, uninterested expression.

"Amy, you try, okay?" I pleaded.

She grabbed the pipe and moved me out of the way, positioning herself next to the ditch. She put one hand carefully on the open end of the pipe. With two quick motions, water came bursting out and she dropped the pipe in place. She turned to us with a satisfied smile. Jennifer clapped and yelled, "Yay!" I shook my head.

We all got in line for siphoning lessons from Amy. She proved to be a much more patient teacher than Brother Brown. He finished starting pipes for all the rows and came back to find us all still practicing. Little streams of water were now filling the ditches next to the trees.

Brother Brown grabbed a shovel that was sitting near the tarp dam and headed into the trees. "Gotta check the rows for breaks," he said. We followed along and watched as he moved dirt around in the little ditches to keep water moving along or prevent it from spilling out into the middle of a row. He mostly tried to ignore us.

Finally he said, "I'll let that run a few hours," and he started walking toward his house.

I could sense that the lesson was over but wanted to get some last-minute clarifications. "So this is the same way Mr. Nelson used to do his irrigation?" I asked, following him through the trees.

"Yep, pretty much."

"Where does the water go at the end of all these rows?"

"The runoff goes down another ditch that heads back to the river."

"And how often should I water like this?"

"Oh, about once a week."

There was so much more I wanted to ask him, so many mistakes I was sure we were going to make. We emerged from the trees next to a machine similar to the one I had seen in our orchard with all the small metal wheels. He turned to me and said, "I better be getting inside."

"Thanks a lot, Brother Brown. I uh, uh..." I couldn't decide what the most important thing to ask was. I finally said, "Can you tell me what this thing does?" pointing at the mysterious machine.

"Call it a disc. Use it to mix up the soil. Good for weeds too," he said, and continued toward his house.

"Thanks again," I called.

"Thank you," yelled Lisa and Jennifer.

We climbed back on the tractor and wagon for the slow ride home. I noticed that no one's shoes were wet. A little muddy, but dry at the socks. As I leaned over the side of the wagon watching the road, I remembered where I had seen those aluminum siphoning pipes before—Mr. Nelson's old shed.

***

After school the next day, Amy, Sam, Michael, and I headed across the road to try and find our irrigation gate. We climbed to the top of the embankment, and the boys and I began inching our way toward the trees and plants that grew next to the deep, fast-moving water.

"I don't want to sound bossy, but maybe that isn't the safest thing to do," yelled Amy.

"What should we do, then?" I called back.

"I don't know for sure, but you boys are all pretty clumsy, and I don't want them to have to fish your drowned bodies out of the canal."

We decided it would be safest if only Amy and I got near the water's edge. Sam and Michael were supposed to walk along the top of the canal watching us so they could run for help if Amy or I fell in. The boys didn't like the plan much, but Amy told them they had no choice.

Amy and I made our way carefully along the canal's edge, holding on to the trees and weeds to avoid slipping into the water. After an hour of searching, Amy spotted a rusty wheel hidden in some willows.

"This has to be it!" I shouted. "Sam and Michael, pile a bunch of rocks up on the bank so we can find it again."

We moved aside the trees, and I grabbed the wheel and tried to turn it. It wouldn't budge, even when Amy and I tried turning it together. It took half a can of mo
tor oil and the leverage of a long metal bar to finally get the wheel moving. I gave a cheer as the gate creaked open and water began to swirl around it.

"Guys, go see if it's coming out somewhere across the road," I called. Sam and Michael took off across the road and ducked through the barbed-wire fence that bordered the trees.

By the time I caught up with them, water was pouring out of the ground and spreading over one corner of the orchard. Some was making its way into a ditch like Brother Brown's, but most of it was flooding through the trees, carrying weeds, dirt, and manure with it.

"I don't think it's going where it's supposed to," said Sam, dancing around the spreading water.

"Turn it off! Close the gate!" I shouted to Amy, who was still across the highway.

We stopped the flood and returned to inspect the damage. "We need a better ditch if we want to use those pipes," said Amy. There were still traces of the ditch Mr. Nelson must have used, but after years of neglect, some spots had completely caved in.

"I think this is the type of thing you need a plow for," I said while moving some of the dirt around.

"Why don't we hook that plow in the middle of the orchard up to the tractor?" suggested Sam, always eager to use the tractor.

When we went to look at the plow, I shook my head
doubtfully. "I'm not sure how you'd connect it to the tractor. And it's so heavy, I don't think we could move it into place, anyway," I said, kicking it.

"We'll have to get our dads to help again. Jackson, go get your dad and I'll get mine. I'll pull the tractor over by this thing, and we'll meet you back here," said Amy decisively.

Our dads moaned and complained but followed the tractor out to the plow. They circled around it a few times, talking with each other about how it might attach. My dad then backed the tractor up to it, and Uncle David and the rest of us pushed against the plow until some of its arms seemed to match the holes and rings on the back of the tractor. My uncle slid some pins in place and stepped back.

"I can't believe that fits! What are the odds?" yelled my uncle. He and my dad were mostly used to parts not matching up.

They were actually excited to drive the tractor around with the plow on it for a few minutes. They figured out which of the tractor's levers to push to make the plow go up and down, and they started digging a little trench down the middle of a row.

"Hey, not there!" Amy shouted.

They finally gave the tractor back, and Amy turned it toward the top of the orchard where the main ditch was supposed to be. We dragged Lisa and Jennifer away from
their homework, and everyone but Amy stood on the plow to weigh it down so we could make the deepest cut possible into the ground. Someone fell off every few feet and had to run and jump back on as Amy steadily drove the length of the orchard. After three passes, we decided the new ditch wasn't getting any deeper and would have to be good enough.

***

The next day we gave watering another try and pulled all the aluminum pipes from Mr. Nelson's tool shed. Underneath the pipes, we found the tarps for making the little dam and secured them in the ditch with some rocks.

"Okay, Amy, you go turn on the water. I'm going to grab every shovel I can find. I have a feeling we'll be needing them," I said to her.

"Everyone else stay here and stay out of the ditch," Amy warned, looking at Sam and Michael.

When I got back with the shovels, water was already pouring out of the ground and most of it was running down the new ditch. Sam and I frantically shoveled dirt and mud to redirect any water moving in the wrong direction. When we reached the dam and tarp, lots of water was leaking around it, but Amy and my sisters were starting siphoning pipes, anyway.

"See what you can do about the dam," Amy demanded.

We got the dam more secure, but the ditch just wasn't very deep and the pipes were hard to start. After a lot of complaining, though, Amy had water dribbling out toward the first ten rows of trees.

"I'll stay here and watch the pipes with the girls," Amy said to me. "You take the boys and figure out where the water's going." She smiled, thinking most of her work was done.

Looking down the rows of trees, it was easy to see there were no nice ditches to channel the water like in Brother Brown's orchard. There may have been at one time, but they were now long gone. Instead, the flowing water was making its own little paths, cutting across
some rows and filling the middle of others. Manure and weeds were carried down the rows, blocking off some of the water's escape.

Sam, Michael, and I tried to unblock some of the largest obstacles to help even out the water flow. We also shoveled to try and redirect water, but as fast as we fixed breaks, new ones appeared. Water eventually reached the end of some of the rows. There was nothing to catch it, so it flowed right toward our houses. It formed large puddles in the driveway and pooled up in our yards.

My dad came running into the orchard. "You birdbrains better turn off that water or you're going to flood this whole place!"

I ran back toward Amy, waving my arms. "Turn it off! Turn it off! It's going everywhere!" I screamed.

Amy and the girls were sitting by the ditch, laughing together, but Amy jumped up and ran across the road to the gate. We spent the rest of the day driving the tractor back and forth through the orchard making little ditches down every row.

The yards of our houses had dried out by Sunday afternoon. By then, my mom and aunt decided they would like the yards to be flooded periodically so they could have a real lawn and flower garden. Amy told them they would probably get it whether they liked it or not.

***