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Reader question: Please explain this sentence: “Small schools go through their ebbs and flows with athletics.” Ebbs and flows? My comments: This is to say that good athletes are hard to come by in small schools. As a result and in consequence, outstanding athletic achievements are few and far between. Ebbs and flows is a term that originally describes the comings and goings of the tides in the sea. Here, it’s likened to the state of athletics in small schools, which, like it is with the sea, sees its own share of ups and downs – and lots more downs than ups, but let me explain by and by. First, ebb and flow. Flow is the word that’s descriptive of floating water in great supply. In “ebb and flow”, it refers to the high tides coming in. Ebb, which describes something that decreases in quantity and volume, refers to the tide retreating from the shores. Therefore, when we talk about the ebb and flow of the sea, we are speaking of the nature of the great oceans, now roaring with its waves lashing rocks near the shores, now receding with such gentleness that we call one of the oceans the Pacific. And because of its unmistakable regularity, people begin to use “ebb and flow” to describe other aspects of life that are similarly affected by such cycles of high and low, up and down, great prosperity and hard times. In our example, the athletics program in small schools is likened to the comings and goings of the tide. | 
