What the Rock Dam Remembers

Andrew McGraw

Oct 12

3 min read

Updated: Oct 14

On obstacles, patience, and the slow work of smoothing

those leaves and branches

try slowing the river’s flow;

yet, they force raging

water over a sharp rock—

just hastening its smoothing

— from “(the earth remembers)”

On one stretch of the river there is a rock dam. After a storm, I like to stand beside it and see what the water has brought. Branches and leaves pile up against the rocks, a record of everything the river carried in the night. The water finds its way through all of it.

At first glance, the dam and its debris look like an obstruction. The leaves and branches are trying to slow the river down, and in a way they succeed. But the water is not stopped. It gathers force and goes over a sharp rock instead. And that, I realized, is how the rock gets smoothed.

The obstacle that does the shaping

In the past, I found that hard to accept in my own life. When something blocked my way, I assumed it was a problem to be removed. It rarely occurred to me that the blockage might be doing something for me. Over time, the water pushing against the rock is what gave the rock its shape. The resistance and the river work on each other.

Another poem of mine says that the Shining River, with patience and gentleness, has shaped those sharp-edged rocks into the memory of her long flowing waters. I like that phrase, “the memory of her long flowing waters.” Each smooth curve is a record of what has passed over it.

Force is not the only way

There is nothing dramatic about this. The river does not fight the dam. She does not announce a plan, and she does not hurry. She keeps flowing. Some days she slips over the top, some days she circles back in a slow current at the edge, and some days she pushes harder. Whatever she does, she does it again the next day.

This is the part I remembered most when I was frustrated. When I was stuck, I tended to think I needed more force, more speed, or a cleverer plan. The river suggested another idea. Steady, patient presence also changes things, and sometimes it changes them more deeply than force does.

Smoothing is not the same as defeating

I do not want to make this sound too tidy. Being worn smooth by something is not always pleasant. The rock, if it could speak, might not describe it as a gift. Some obstacles are heavy, and some leave marks. Calling something a teacher does not mean it was fair or easy.

Still, looking back, I can see some of my own sharp edges that were smoothed by what I resisted at the time. Impatience, certainty, the need to be right. I did not choose to be reshaped. It happened over a long time, usually while I was busy complaining about the delay.

I haven’t mastered this. Obstacles can still tempt me to push harder than I need to, and I am still learning, on the Way, to trust the slow work of the river.

An invitation to reframe

Consider something that is currently in your way. It could be a deadline, a difficult relationship, a stalled project, or a stubborn habit. Take a few minutes to write down two things. First, what is this obstacle asking of me? Second, what in me might be getting smoothed while I move through it?

You do not need to love the answer. The question itself shifts your position from someone being blocked to someone being shaped.