It made the rest of us gape and then take stock of our own lives. Our problems shrank and made room for our hearts to reach out. The flood drew us out of the normal stream of things to help those dragged under by the flood. So you can't say this flood beat us. This flood showed us our place by the river.
Water destroys by lifting and pushing.
But its real power is gravity. Falmouth, Ky., was buried under the muddy water of the Licking River. Down to the river and down to the sea. Slowly or with freight-train speed, running water envelops everything in its path. A single flood has many faces.