Summer & Water

How hard would you work for water? I have to admit that how hard I would work for water would be inverse to how hot it is out. (Math points for Amy!) aka the hotter it is, the less I’d want to work for water.

But alas, summer is here and that means we may or may not have water in the Kenet. Which means we may or may not be able to wash dishes. We may or may not be able to wash clothes. We may or may not be able to take showers. We may or may not be able to flush the toilet with the push of a button. We may or may not be able to do a lot of things depending on our supply of water.

When water comes, we have tanks on top of the house that hold the water. Hopefully more water comes in before the tanks are empty.

Our landlord takes care of the water for us. He pumps the water up to our tank (which we share with the family). The past couple days, water hasn’t been coming from the city. Our landlord said he had been getting water from his in-laws. It’s not uncommon for people who have water, to share with those who don’t. I just assumed that he had run some tubes from their house to ours.

I was happy for this because last summer, when we had water shortages, they would get water from pretty far away from where we live, fill up water jugs and then carry them back in a wheelbarrow. Sometimes making multiple trips. They said we (Nicole and I) were used to having water so they wanted to make sure that we would have water.

Knowing how hard they work to make sure Nicole and I have water makes it easier for us to conserve water, to not take long showers, to not wash clothes as often, to not wash dishes (who am I kidding, we never complained about that one!), to not flush the toilet unless it needed to be.

And last summer they worked extremely hard (on top of their regular job) and did everything in their power to make sure we had water. So I thought putting some new tubes in between the houses so they didn’t have to carry water back and forth was an improvement over last summers methods of getting water.

Last night a truck pulled in with a big tank on the back in addition to some very large plastic tubs. I thought the family had bought an extra water tank or something (there are 6 people sharing one water tank). But turns out they hired a truck to bring a water tank over and fill up the other house’s tank. The front house hadn’t had enough water in several days to fill up their tank though we have had water. It causes me to wonder if they went without so that we could have.

This family never ceases to amaze me.