Brushing My Teeth in Two Ounces of Water

Today, the plumber came and turned off our water. There was a leak in the pipes and the plumber couldn't fix it for three days. "Three days!!!", I exclaimed.

It is amazing how helpless you are suddenly when there is no ready supply of water.

I quickly filled a few buckets and some other receptacles and then that was that - the water was off. I washed my hands with just a few cups of water. The process went like this: get the hands wet, apply soap, scrub, then add more water until there were no suds left. Brushing teeth was extremely economical. I was able to brush my teeth AND rinse with just one cup of water.

I realized that most of our water usage habits are based on laziness.

I am not as bad these days as I used to be back before Al Gore was a Nobel Peace Prize winner. I used to leave the tap running in many situations, including when I was brushing my teeth. Even though I have much better habits nowadays, having NO water made me think just how far I could push this conservation thing. I became a super-efficient "water hero" who only used exactly what he needed. Actually, in the third world, most everyone consumes water like this, and much less I'm sure.

It was annoying having to use the neighbor's shower, but having to shape my consumption habits was really no more time-consuming than my regular routines - once I adjusted, that is. We really don't appreciate how lucky we are to have limitless clean water flowing out of our taps on command and we certainly have no idea about the true value of water until there is none!

So CONSERVE it!!!