Spring ahead and fall back. That is a saying that gives us guidance on how our watches should be set. The changing of time can be quite an undertaking in this day and age. Our homes are filled with flashing digital timepieces &045; VCRs, stoves, computers, microwave ovens, thermostats, radios, TVs and oh, yeah, clocks and watches. Even our vehicles have clocks that need setting. Just changing the time on my watch makes me feel like I need a degree from MIT in order to accomplish the task.

When I was a child, we didn’t worry much about getting the correct time on our digital timepieces.

We were digital free. Our timepieces all required winding.

Our big concern in the spring, right after the snowmelt, centered on gravel. We lived on a gravel road. Our driveway was supposed to be gravel, but due to budget restraints, it was usually more dirt than gravel. The gravel road and our driveway were both prone to frost boils &045; upheavals in the road that produced either bumps or potholes. We had potholes in our driveway that could hide a Buick. The best thing that could be said about our driveway was that it ran downhill from the house. When the snow lost its white, our driveway became a muddy mess. Even a little snow made for a lot of water. So each spring, during the time that I now spend setting my clocks, we, as a family, would attack the driveway. Armed with spades, hoes, rakes, sharpened sticks and good intentions, we would excavate rivers in the driveway while being encouraged by the bird songs in our yard.

I would wear my river-making boots. They were five-buckle overshoes with a couple of patches on each. The overshoes were black in color &045; the patches never were. The boots leaked only slightly, but they kept the mud in its place. Those boots were made for walking in the mud. They were made for those who made rivers.

We would dig with a spade for a bit. Then we would hoe some and rake a little. Finally, we would stick. I guess if we hoe with a hoe and rake with a rake; we would stick with a stick. The sticks made the best rivers. To plow a furrow in the muddy drive with a sharp stick and then see the water rush to fill it, well, it was magic. The rivers were things of beauty. The rivers would provide white-water rafting to ants riding on bits of dried cornstalk. The rivers would uncover lovely rocks in interesting shapes. The stones, freed from their earthly confinement, often found their way into one of my pockets to be polished the old fashioned way &045; by carrying them. They were a joy to me, but a pain to my mother and her washing machine.

I would create rivers, tributaries, dams and reservoirs. I was like an important member of the Army Corps of Engineers who had gone mad with power. I didn’t need to know a lot to make the rivers. All I really needed to know was that water tends to flow downhill. The rivers would run north to the end of our driveway where it would dump its flow into the ditch running alongside the township road. This spot was where the orange school bus picked me up each morning, much to my parents’ delight, and delivered me to school, much to my teachers’ dismay. This was the same location that was the coldest spot on earth during the winter.

I would nearly freeze at the end of the drive while waiting for the bus.

Windchill wasn’t talked about much, but it was experienced. My mother would insist that I wear a stocking cap while waiting for the bus. She didn’t want me getting sick. Nobody wanted me to get sick &045; I was a bit of a whiner. I would wear the cap until I’d hear the bus. Then I would hide it in a snow-filled culvert. Wearing a cap to school was embarrassing in those days. One of the neighbors put an old outhouse at the end of his driveway for his kids to stay warm in. The biffy turned warming house was completely ignored by the children as too embarrassing to use. I gladly put up with what I considered to be the coldest place on earth because I knew when spring arrived, I would be making rivers. Oh, I still spring ahead and fall back. I still change the countless clocks and watches that inhabit the Batt Cave.

It was easier making rivers.

Hartland resident Al Batt writes columns for the Wednesday and Sunday editions of the Tribune.