Water, water everywhere, but not a drop to drink...
-Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

It was 2:30 in the afternoon when the call came.

Production of your newspapers was in turmoil. A power outage in Collingwood was into its second hour; the water levels in Stayner and Wasaga Beach were rising rapidly and we packed up our laptops and made a break for Wasaga just before Mosley Street was closed at 58th. The Internet service isn't as fast in Wasaga, but at least there was service.

The call had nothing to do with newspaper production. It was about my basement, then flooding with runoff from the rapid melt.

Among the frantic dialogue of a soggy-footed spouse I deduced that the water was about a half-an-inch in the laundry room and heading south-west across the new laminate flooring in the bedroom and toward the fireplace, thence to Avening.

"It's coming out the walls! About three feet up; it's just pouring out!"

Light bulb moment.

"It's coming out the wall where the sump pump hose goes out, right?"

"Yes."

"There's a leak in the hose. Turn the sump pump off."

I admit, dear readers, to a brief moment of divided loyalty here.

But once I knew nobody was going to drown and knew the problem was mechanical in nature I was content to stay focused on your newspapers once again.

"There's a new hose in the garage," I said. "Get the first kid home from school to get a screwdriver and run the new hose out the window."

Two weekends later, the block wall is dried out, there's a protective sleeve on the sump pump hose and, by all accounts our dumpster full of soggy drywall and peeled flooring is minor compared to others.

For the past 14 days the region has witnessed a melt-down of - well, not quite biblical proportions but - certainly different than any spring runoff in the memory of most long-time residents.

As a trick of nature, there were many people who took the setback in stride, even with levity.  

On the other hand those who suffered a financial setback and a tremendous disruption to their lifestyles aren't viewing it the same way.

One of the great ironies was the door-to-door delivery of water to flooded homes in Avening where submerged wells were clearly not offering potable water.

Residents in Wasaga Beach who once had lush lawns are dealing with front yard sandboxes resulting from the silt of the 58th Street gorge.

And on the banks of the Mad River, Clearview Township has spent more than $50,000 trucking sewage to Stayner to prevent untreated effluent from entering the Mad River.

After a prolonged power outage Saturday, the effluent arriving at the Creemore treatment plant reportedly tripled and confirmed what officials have known all along. Some people - a lot of people - are sump-pumping their wet basements into the sanitary sewers and we're all going to pay for it.

All of this is to say that flood waters are serious. A whole lot of people have been inconvenienced and a bunch face a large cleanup costs.

So when the NVCA denies you permission to build a new house on flood plain, remember that, thanks to the vagaries of nature and the impact of man on our watercourses, water is not to be taken for granted and drinking water isn't the only issue in this area.