(Originally published May 2017 on TheScoop2017.)
I’m sitting on my screened-in porch, watching a storm move in from the west, with its dark and foreboding clouds blanketing the far hills. The grasses, brown from drought, bend in the breeze as the clouds begin to layer in deeper shades until the yard is draped in a deep dusk. Heavy clouds hang down menacingly. The birds scatter to find shelter, kicking up the sweet aroma of earth. Soon single, large drops begin to fall, until the sky rumbles, then a loud crack, shaking the floor, and the sky opens, dumping a heavy downpour of water beating on the roof, the stairs, the ground. Walls of water sweep past, chased by wind, curved lines of rain rushing across the fields. And the wind pushes the front eastward, hurrying it along. As quickly as it arrived, it moves on, leaving behind a steady, soft pattering of drops, in rhythm to my soul, soothing the emotions as I sit, listening, pondering, water.
Where does all this water go? Some is pooling up in the low spots in the yard, The thirsty plants soaking it up. The rest, I imagine, trickles through the soil until it reaches rock, eventually making its way to fill up the hole made by our well a few hundred feet below the surface.
Not all of it goes down into the ground though. Some slips down the roof tile, through the downspouts, pouring out onto the street, running to join with more, passing a storm drain, then running down the hill, collecting in a stream until it reaches another stream, then splashing into the lake down the road with its sandstone bottom and rocks protruding from its sides. I can picture those tall white pines leaning forward, suspended, waiting in groaned silence until they once again see their reflection in a calm surface, until the pinging of the water created by thousands of individual little drops cease.
Geologists tell us that water covers seventy percent of the earth’s surface, but only one percent is freshwater that we can use. The lake, long with rivers and wetlands, store most of this water above ground. The rest, around twenty percent, is hidden below the earth’s surface in underground gravel beds. Some of these ‘aquifers,’ are so far below the surface that it takes hundreds to thousands of years for the water to trickle down, drop by drop, through the earth’s crust to fill them up.
I had been cleaning my house and had sat down for a break. I’m a little thirsty so I head to the kitchen and turn on the faucet. The pipes in my house are PVC pipes because I live in a newer house. Evidently, these are safer or cheaper than other materials such as aluminum or copper. But back in the day, we didn’t have PVC and lead pipes were used to connect homes and businesses across communities to local water purification systems. Now, years later, it turns out these pipes are posing a problem. According to an article in DesMogBlog, there are an estimated 1.2 million miles of lead pipes running through American communities and it is estimated the cost to tear up concrete and dig out these pipes to replace them will cost a staggering one trillion dollars. Water prices have already risen some 40 percent since 2010 and are expected to continue to rise. At this rate of increase, it is expected that 35.6 percent of Americans will not be able to afford water services in five years. But these pipes need to be replaced. In Flint, Michigan, contaminants from the Flint River pushed through the lead pipes in that community and delivered lead contaminated water to residents for two years before anyone figured it out. According to a Reuters report mentioned in the article, Flint is not alone. Nearly 3,000 other locations in the U.S. has lead levels at least twice as high as Flint. I am glad my water comes from our own well.
I put my glass to my lips and begin to take a drink, but just as I tip my head back to take that first gulp, my eye catches a glimpse of the cleaning bucket I left sitting on the floor next to the cupboard. It’s staring at me, wondering why I’m not finishing my job. But the water is now cold and grey with gunk settled on the bottom. I know there’s a whole tank of hot water sitting idly in the basement, ready and waiting to be used.
A noise at the front door rescues me. The dog’s paw has smeared mud on the glass insert and he has his slimy nose pressed against the glass looking for me to let him in. I’d feel more perturbed if I didn’t love this creature so. I open the door carefully to catch the sloppy lump of fur before it would have a chance to leave marks on my clean floor, but his slick body slides through my hands. I realize I’ll be pumping some of that hot water into the the tub to give the dog a bath. Normally he rolls on dry, hard earth, creating a small cloud of dust which either falls off him or settles deep within his undercoat before he makes his way up to the house. I guess I can’t blame him for rolling in the mud to cool himself off from this heat. It must have felt awfully good.
Water is so hard to predict. During many springs, there is news of too much water. Bloated rivers overflow their banks turning fields and roads into lakes. People lose their homes, having to be rescued from the tops of their houses because water rose to meet the roof. Or the too many rainy days cause basements to flood where the aquifer is close to the surface and has more than it can hold. I remember a few years ago there was so much rain the water saturated the earth between a lake and a river, causing the ground to give way into the river taking with it the homes on this small piece of land and draining the lake dry.
That’s not the case this spring. We’ve been having a dry spell so this rain is a blessing. The parched tips of emerging plants in the field, the grass, crusty underfoot. I’m thankful this rain is lingering so the ground can drink in all it wants, all it needs. The western part of the country hasn’t been quite as lucky. Neither has the midwest. There has been a ten year drought in the west and a five year drought in the midwest. The problem with droughts is that people still need water. Crops still need water. Animals still need water. So, to grow the thirsty corn and alfalfa crops for livestock, as well as food for people to eat, and to supply water to the millions of people living in the drought affected regions, some surface reservoirs have been nearly depleted and a lot of water has been pumped out of aquifers. In some areas, especially in Texas where the southern portion of the Oglala Aquifer is very far below the surface, a lot of this fossil water, as some call it, has been used up in a very short amount of time. Some fear the quantity of water consumed in our country is not sustainable. Luckily this past winter and spring, the West has received ample rainfall, refilling many of the depleted reservoirs. While I would like to ponder this dilemma longer, I need to give my attention to a dirty dog who needs a bath.
I have the dog quarantined in the bathroom while I fill the tub, careful to keep the water at a comfortable temperature for my canine family member. His wet blob is lying on the floor, shaking in anticipation. I’d prefer to think he is excited about getting clean, but I know better from past bathing experiences. The hardest part of the bath, for he and I, is hoisting his rather large, heavy frame over the edge of the tub. God did not endow him with long, springy legs. I’ll spare you from the details of the fight that ensued. Let’s just say that not only he, but myself and the bathroom were completely soaked by the time he was in. That is saying nothing for getting him out. I’ll leave that to your imagination, though here’s a clue – not until after he was toweled down, blown dry by my own hairdryer, and smelling pretty, did I allow for his release from his torture chamber so he could go curl up in a ball somewhere to stop shaking. At least he will not be adding to the now muddy floor.
The cold and dirty water in the bucket sufficed to clean the paw prints off the floor before I dumped it out. I put a kettle of water on the stove to cook pasta for dinner and put some hamburger into a skillet to brown. Then I commenced to chop an onion to cook with the meat. Did you know growing food for people and animals takes an estimated 80 percent of all the fresh water used in America? When we take into consideration all the water used to grow crops for animals to eat, which we, in turn eat, researchers estimate it takes a total of 1800 gallons to raise one pound of beef. It would be one thing to use this much water to maintain our food supply, but based on a study done in 2010 nearly 133 billion pounds of food was thrown away. In fact, 23 percent of every pound of beef gets discarded, which is like throwing out 400 gallons of water for every pound of beef raised. It is estimated the amount of food that gets wasted is equivalent to 21 percent of all the freshwater used. This rotten apple I found in my refrigerator just now, which I am about to throw in the trash, is like throwing 25 gallons of water down the drain.
Dinner is almost complete and as I call the family in from their varied tasks, I notice the rain has begun to subside. I pick up a children’s book from off the table so I can lay down the plates and silverware I’m holding. I’ve read the book a hundred times to the kids and know it by heart. “I can’t go over it, can’t go around it, can’t go through it . . .” The character of the book is faced with a new obstacle on each page and needs to figure out how to get past them. Each page reveals a new method. It reminds me of water, how we don’t have any control over when it falls from the sky and in what quantities, whether we will have too much or too little. We do our best to store up during the plenty to use during times of shortage, but even then, as we discovered these past years, our best efforts can come up short. Still, this is better than no efforts at all. As in the children’s book, there is always a way to get over the hurdle. As it pertains to water, we have maintained our usage is several cities, even though the population in these cities has increased. This means people are using less water, being conscientious about how their own individual actions matter collectively in the long run. We also rise to the occasion through invention, like Terry LeBleu who developed a portable water generator which produces water by condensing due from the air, and new technologies that make growing crops more efficient or reduces electricity needs which uses a lot of water in electricity creation. Now that the drought has possibly ended in the West, there is a little relief for that part of the country. Still, we all must be diligent to consume only what we need and waste as little of this precious resource as possible.