Literal and metaphorical reflection pervade this place of poor drainage, where a once-thriving farmstead has been surrendered to the rising groundwater and its expansive flooding. Water tables and stream flows have been growing gradually in much of the Nebraska Sandhills for the last two decades, at least. A check of satellite imagery over time shows ponds forming and enlarging in recent years across what were center-pivot-irrigated lands on and near this farm. That process has accelerated. The aged state of its cladding reveals that this house was left to the elements long before the water encroached in the last year or two.
