Saturday, May 1, 2010

Simple Pleasure

     Last March we got some grim news from Jorge, our property manager.  Our cistern had run dry twice (fortunately it filled the next day, both times) and he predicted that by April we would be in a water crisis where our cistern would only be filled 2 times for the ENTIRE month.  Up to this point, our cistern was being filled twice a week.

     The entire capital was feeling the pinch of a very dry "wet season".  Locals talked about this being the driest the capital has been in 80 to 100 years.  100,000 capitalinos were without water in their cisterns.  We have 2 cisterns for the 6 units in our apartment building.

     We were scratching out heads, trying to figure out how we had contributed to the draining of our cistern.  Twice.   Granted, we are sharing this cistern with two other apartments.  But, we were already water conscious denizens.  We are Californians!  We know about water shortages!  We know about turning off the water while brushing teeth and washing the dishes.  We always fill the washing machine full... never those skimpy loads!  We turn off the water when we shave... I even started collecting the water before getting in the shower while I was waiting for the hot water heater to kick in.  We tried to think of other ways to reduce our water consumption.  Sorry kids, but bath time is next on the chopping block.  So they started taking showers with us in the morning.  This was not a popular idea.  They love  bath time together.  But we had to make some dire and necessary changes.  Fortunately, for all of April our cistern never went dry.

     Last week we noticed that our downstairs neighbor was out of town.  His car was gone and we hadn't seen him.  AhHa!  One less person using water!  (It's so funny how our brains work in crisis mode).  So the kids were surprised tonight with the treat of a bath.  We will still have them take showers and we will continue to use as little water as possible, but the bath was just so much fun!



No comments:

Post a Comment