Water Shortage

Like everyone else, I'm wishing it would rain. I wish it would rain for days and days. The grass, trees and shrubs look like they'd go up in flames and then wipe out the whole city with one massive fire if anyone lit a match or threw a cigarette aside.

I'm trying hard to use as little water as possible and recycle what I can. We have a timer in the bathroom to ensure everyone sticks to the four minute shower rule. I keep Henry's bath water and throw it on the plants (by the way there's something in Johnsons baby bath that the plants love), I fill a bucket with water from the washing machine and throw that on the garden too but it barely seems to make a difference. Everything is just so dry and brittle. It's like the world is tired.

Before Maya was born her Dad and I bought a 126 acre property a little way north of Brisbane but thirty kilometres from the nearest town. On that property was an A-Frame house. A tiny wee house big enough to swing a cat but not much else. In that house had lived a widow and her four strapping sons. They had lived there for many years without any form of running water and no dam and no water storage devices of any kind. When we went to inspect the property we noted that they had about 50 four litre orange juice bottles filled with water lined up on the kitchen floor. Apparently when they went to town to do their fortnightly shop they took the bottles and filled them with town water from the local park. They didn't shower because there was no bathroom to speak of and no running water in the house. I didn't bother to ask them how they kept themselves clean because I really didn't want to know. The Matriarch did all the clothes washing by hand in a bucket and then put the water out for the ten mangy dogs to drink after she'd finished with it.

There were old car bodies strewn about the place and a shed literally filled with nesting rats. The place was a mess, but it was cheap and it had the most magical view over the valley.

The first thing we did when we moved in was to organise an excavator to dig a massive dam in a low where the creeks all met. Then we waited for it to rain. In the mean time we bought an aluminium water tank and paid to have it filled with water and then gravity fed it to the house. This meant we were able to at least wash dishes and clothes and clean our teeth. With no shower or bathroom facilities yet installed we showered outside with a camp shower strung up beneath the frangipanni tree. They were possibly some of the best showers I have ever had. A view of the moutains in front, lush tropical bush behind and no visible neighbours.

Maya was born in that house, well not born there but born into it. She was a delightful bush baby. Every day we took her for bush walks strapped in the backpack on our backs. She'd fall asleep to the sound of the Butcher Bird who followed us around on our walks. She was also born into a home where effort was required just to fill a bathtub with water. For some time after we finally purchased a bath tub we just sat it outside on the front deck overlooking the mountain and plugged it up and filled it with water from a bucket and lay in there taking a bath under the stars. She loved it. We left there when she was not quite two so she does not remember it. I remember well though the difficulties of getting and keeping water. When we moved back to the city it was such a novelty to be able to turn on a tap and just let it run. Each and every time I did though I felt guilty. I felt wasteful. It was such a precious commodity once for some time and it seemed ridiculous to me that my neighbours in the city felt no shame in running their sprinklers all night while they slept.

We should have seen the drought coming many years ago and been prepared for it. Once upon a time every home had a tank and then they were told to remove them because of the health hazard they may cause. Now the councils are paying people to install them once again.

Maybe they should insist everyone gets themselves 50 four litre orange juice bottles.