There's always something worse that could happen, there's always enough room to go down but, aiming high and looking above average horizons is what made the man build trains and automobiles, and let us all have access to electricity, water and internet. Yes, having access to the world wide web, for most of the civilized world, is no longer a question, so what can go wrong?
COVID-19? No, this post is not about this sickness, although I could write about it daily but, there isn't enough public to read and I would become that guy who should be avoided hence let's look at something else. It's running water that I want to write about in this post. That common subject that nobody would even think of creating a post around it, the service many of us take for granted and a resource that seems endless.
Well, it might be endless but, it sometimes needs maintenance, and when you live in a country that's on a crisis ever since the well known communist leader, Ceausescu died, you can expect anything. Honestly, I am expecting anything from this country, but I wasn't expecting a running water shortage today, in my town, and I wasn't even thinking, when I saw the flow shrinking this morning, that we're gonna run out of running water for three days...
Yep, it's gonna be Sunday, which is almost over, Monday and Tuesday, the apocalyptic days when a small 15,000 folks town will be short of running water. What's there to be done, or should I say, what I have done to make my life survivable? First of all, I headed to the supermarket and bought drinking water, because I usually drink from what the town provides, and it's perfectly drinkable but, now it won't provide for a few days. I bought myself about 12 litres of water, and managed to save some 20 more in a few cans that I had around the house, for washing and toilet.
There's no way of even thinking of cooking, or showering, although I do hope the guys will fix the damage sooner than expected, and that we will get back to normal but, not being able to shower is a though one. Plus there's dishes, the toilet, brushing my teeth and so on... Daily tasks that you do on auto pilot which show how fragile we really are during such times.
I remember spending time at my grandma when I was a kid, and for a long time, I guess till '98 or so, she didn't had running water in her village, so we had a fountain that provided us with water, we had wash basins and some sort of reservoirs that would provide the water, that we would charge them with, and for showers we had to warm that water, basically not having anything of the sort...running on autopilot. That was one or two weeks per year experience, and it was soo long ago.
Now, thinking of not taking a shower for three days is kind of unimaginable, and although I hope we shall have the problem fixed asap, I can call this a lesson packed inside another. We still have the lock down that we haven't got rid off, and now no running water for a few days, so there's the cherry on the pie but, what's the lesson?
It starts with appreciation... for every little thing, and tap, that we can switch to have the most basic comfort at any time. I guess no one says thank you God for tap water on a daily basis, but when you run out of it, you realize you would chant to some running water God to have it back. It doesn't work that way, and we're definitely not creating this situation by ourselves by not thanking God for running water, but these two last months have really shown me how fragile we are.
How convenient we have become, and how much we rely on things, services and people. Not too long ago we were men of action, we were hunters, cultivators and fighters, and now we fight on social media, we rely almost entirely on supermarkets, and we hunt pork from the market's shelf. If all those go down, we go down, so how much have we evolved really as a species and society? Are we even a self sustaining one?
It's the piece of tech that connects us to the world behind a 5" screen that defines our evolution, it's amazon Prime and getting that nice present on time that defines it, ordering food while sticking our fat asses on a couch watching Netflix all day, or what?!... Well those are evolutionary steps as well, but on the other hand this evolution hit us at a cost, a pricey one, and during challenging times like these ones, we realize how exposed and fragile we are.
The problem is that we rely too much on a system, or a bunch of systems if you ask me, and that's where we stopped evolving. The perfect modern man, or lets say the perfect version of myself, would have a garden to plant his own healthy vegetables, would have cows and chickens, an orchard, a well with fresh water, internet access, a fast car and cryptos, but he should not rely on depend on only one provider for anything in his house hold. Yes, that vision might sound weird but I dream of it.
We rely too much, in my opinion, on providers and that's the mistake of the century that we're making. The providers have already shown us that they can lock us down at the push of a button, and if supermarkets and groceries stores, along with electric power and running water services would suddenly crash and would be left idle for weeks or months, we would pretty much be fucked, because we're not that sustainable as individual anymore.
I know, the water will be running again as it should, two days from now, I will be able to get out of the house at any hour, two weeks from now, like I did before the pandemic and even travel, and I will still be able to make a living again, but I recently noticed how exposed I, and probably many others are, and how much we're part of this system. So, what's the worse that can happen?
Thanks for attention,
Adrian