Thoughts on Water...

Some rites of passage into adulthood are fun. Like writing checks for example, I always feel like my maturity goes up at least 3 points whenever I write a check.  Making grocery store lists is my most recent banner of adulthood I proudly fly as I ease into my motherhood title with grace.  I have recently reached a whole new level of postpubescence and sophistication with production of my own offspring.   There are some downfalls to this whole adult thing.  When you're a teenager people expect you to say stupid things, be completely saturated with you, you, and a lot more you, an act impetuously as you try to say no to drugs and safely navigate yourself through the years of toliet papering, and texting. Maybe I missed some part of this magical metamorphasis because sometimes I still have impulsive desires and just want to play a good old fashioned round of truth or dare.  I don't think getting my braces off removed my immaturity.  Even though my prom corsage has long since biodegraded and returned to mother Earth and I no longer put on headgear at night, I still laugh at the exact same things that made me laugh when I was in 11th grade.  I pack a diaper bag now for heavens sake and yet I admit I still stuff in some wintergreen lifesavers and treats for myself in that bag for boring sacrament meeting talks just in case.  I thought I would really arrive and feel like an adult when I finally was permitted to shave my legs, buy my first deoderant (I can never forget that first stick of "Teen Spirit", it was purple and tropical breeze scent) and drive a car.  Now I drive around a carseat with a living breathing child in it and yet I still feel those same silly girl giddy feelings when G kisses me sometimes as I did when I would ride my bike past my first crush's house over and over again.  I wonder if I will be in the nursing home still waiting to feel like a real live adult. Anyway, the point of all of this is that there is one adult thing that we do now that I do not like.  Paying bills. We got our first water bill last month and it was $66.  Sixty six bones to brush our teeth and make koolaid with a few showers.  G called just to make sure they knew that we didn't have a pool and there wasn't a mistake.  Well, oddly enough we got our water bill this month and....once again it was an outrageous $66.  I think it's fishy.  We're going to start showering like this soon if it doesn't go down:

Anyway, I was complaining like Laman because water is not an invention.  It falls out of the sky. For free.  So I was just having a hard time processing why the heck we were paying 8 Cafe Rio burritos worth to just have a necessity that naturally comes from Mother Earth.  Paying $66 to rend a ferrari or borrow a scanning electron microscope I can understand, but water? I'm beginning to get nervous that we're going to start getting a bill for breathing.  My heart was dramatically softened when I read an article on water and women and learned the following facts:

In just one day, more than 200 million hours of women’s time is consumed for the most basic of human needs — collecting water for domestic use.  This lost productivity is greater than the combined number of hours worked in a week by employees at Wal*Mart, United Parcel Service, McDonald’s, IBM, Target, and Kroge
Approximately one in eight people in the world lack access to safe water
3.575 million people die each year from water-related disease
The average North American uses 400 liters of water every day.
The average person in the developing world uses 10 liters of water every day for their drinking, washing and cooking.
The women carrying water in Ethiopia carry an average of 40 lbs of water on their heads and spend 5-8 hours every day transporting water.

So, as I sit here in my gluttony, not putting my dishwasher on the "light wash" cycle, I have decided to not complain.  It truly is incomprehensible to recognize what we have.  One of my wifely duties that does not thrill my homemaker heart is laundry.  As I was loading in the whites I suddenly had a flashback to my mission and remembered the women of Ecuador doing their laundry as well, only they had dirty well water, a rock and their arms to get the job done.  How quickly I forget.  In keeping with the water theme of this post  I will post a pic that demonstrates my American gluttony and overabundance which I enjoy every second of my pampered life.  While women are carrying the equivalent of a carryon filled with bowling balls on their head, Garrett, Liv and I spent last week in Michigan enjoying the family with homecooked cuisine, frequent swims in the pool and soaking up the family bonding rays.

I love water.  I love America.  I'm so glad that I only have to walk 6 feet instead of 60 miles to take something for granted that is such a necessity. In conclusion: