ROADBLOCK

I am a tiny stream trickling over the wet sand across the beach to the sea. I trickle happily until some kids turn up with their buckets and spades and start to dam me by shovelling a wall of sand across my path. They want to create a little pond by creating a roadblock.

Lucy, my friend, is a writer. She frequently comes to paddle in my stream. We talk. She is sympathetic, and she tells me she gets roadblocks as well. She is writing a detective story, and her four suspects don’t have the character to commit murder, they have no motives, they all have alibis, and none of them has the opportunity to commit murder. She also needs to create an original detective and setting.

We both face roadblocks. We are stuck. But we both have powerful weapons. I have a continuing flow of water; Lucy has a continuing flow of imagination. We make use of them. I see weak spots in the dam wall and test them. The kids shovel more sand and keep blocking me up. Meanwhile, Lucy tries to find a suspect who could have committed the murder, but the evidence stumps her. We are blocked, but we both employ our reserves. I get more water, and my pond is deepening. Lucy’s imaginative brain is whirring.

I see my chance, a weak spot in the sand wall, and I direct a flow at it. The wall weakens. I trickle through an overflow channel. Lucy finds a way to make her story flow.  She identifies a likely contender among her suspects.  He has the character to commit murder, a motive, a weak alibi, and an opportunity to commit the crime. Lucy is delighted. We are both starting to flow, but we haven’t fully solved our dilemmas. We are still essentially blocked, Lucy has no compelling detective or unique setting

To my surprise, the kids don’t mind me flowing through my overflow channel; they still have a good pond. They enhance the setting of my overflow channel by decorating it with seaweed and flotsam. Lucy also thinks of a wonderful setting to decorate her story, the Daintree Rainforest.

But we both need detectives. Fortunately, the kids helped me again. They net a little fish in the nearby rockpool and drop it in me. My fish detective swims around trying to find a way out, finally it detects my overflow channel, swims through and is free. The kids return it to the rockpool and play there, leaving me free to break down the dam wall and surge out. Meanwhile, Lucy comes up with her own mesmerising detective, a native bushman who can detect even the smallest clues to track people down.

We have both overcome our blockages. Lucy is free to write her next novel, and, at last, I peacefully trickle along the beach. My only worry is when the next bunch of kids will come along and frustrate me by building another roadblock.