Water, Water Everywhere. And Not a Drop to Drink.
This past weekend, 38 communities in the Boston metropolitan areas were hit with a boil water advisory. The reason is too complicated to explain, but the outcome was a full out “aquapocolypse”. You couldn’t drink or brush your teeth with the water, but you could bathe and put out fires with it. That’s refreshingly straightforward, right? Not for this mom, who lives comfortably in her suburb, where she is relatively unscathed by natural disasters.
The call came in while I was out of the house, and I was advised to buy some water on the way home. When I got to the grocery store parking lot, people were running – yes – RUNNING to their cars with carriages filled with the precious liquid. So I panicked. I was not going to be denied, so I grabbed a carriage and went barreling down the isles in a quest to get whatever I could. To the people I knocked over along the way – sorry, but you snooze, you lose.
At home, things got chaotic. What was once a pretty simple order to follow had become more complicated and confusing. First there was the issue of the bath – should she soak in a tub? Should we go for a shower, but what happens if she (gasp!) swallows a teaspoon of the water? The dishwasher can … no CAN’T be used … And, we need to boil enough water to have on hand if a Rhino needs to give birth on my lawn.
Within two hours, the kitchen is piled high with dirty pots and pans, and we’re eating off of left-over holiday plates in the shape of a crazed Thanksgiving Turkey. I’m boiling sippy cups – and I’m trying to decide if I compost the items that are not treated with potable water, will that ultimately seep into the ground water and … AAAHH!!!!!!!! Why is this so damn complicated!?!?!
Showering became an exercise in lung control, as I was holding my breath so as not to poison myself. Which caused me to go light headed while shaving my legs, passing out in the tub and waking up 90 seconds later with a strip of shaved leg, an exploded shaving cream can and a mouthful of water.
I’m thinking I may need to invest in a well.
