My Wild Water
Story
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Etzatlan, the little agricultural town to which I moved ten
years ago, is bursting out of its britches.
In practical terms, to those of us living here, growth shows
in various ways. Parking near the center of town is nearly impossible. Traffic
has increased exponentially. Building happens, tear downs, remodels, add-ons
and build ups, on every block. Corporate greenhouses sprout like acres of
mushrooms. Strangers who work in Guadalajara have discovered this as a viable
bedroom community, hence, cookie-cutter, ticky-tacky housing colonias, which
were not here yesterday, seemingly magically rose from the ground.
Nowhere does this growth show more clearly, to me, than in
our water situation. “Situation” is my make-nice term for shortage. The city
has dug two new wells but growth out paces infrastructure.
This is my story so
all I can tell you is how I adjust the best I can, to the “situation” which
became alarming about three years ago. These “situations” always, always become
alarming too late. I think it is a natural law, like gravity, polarity, and
cause and effect.
I quit watering my lawn. A lawn is a British affectation. My
grass is native so it’s nature is to brown in the dry season and green up in
the rainy times. I drastically reduced my garden to essential herbs, fruit
trees and a few essential flowers. Don’t argue with me. Flowers are essential
to health.
I pat myself on my head and said, “That’s nice, honey.”
Nice, but, not enough. We began having “no water” days in which no water flowed
down the pipes from the city wells, not just to us out on the periphery but
people in town also don’t have water. In the beginning, these days were during
the height of the hot season. Now these days are any week of the year.
My 500-liter tinaco (water storage tank) on the roof is
adequate for my one-person household but is inadequate in a crisis.
Leo, my all-purpose helper, and I put our heads together.
Three days ago I bought a 2500-liter tinaco for a cistern or reservoir. Two
days ago my huge tank was delivered. Yesterday, the plumber/electrician came to
hook my tank up to city water. My tank began filling. One could stand near it
and listen to the water falling from the pipe on top.
Late in the same afternoon, I was standing in the shower
when my shower slowed, dribbled and quit. Water had showered down—and then it
didn’t.
I phoned Leo who was at the hardware store buying hose to move
water from Big Tinaco on the ground up to Little Tinaco on the roof. “Do you
think gravel might have plugged the water line again?”
No. My Little Tinaco was bone dry. Leo climbed the ladder to
the roof, cleaned the tinaco, a semi-annual job anyway, hooked up the new hose
to the new pump and pumped water from BT to LT. We’d had drastically low water
pressure all week. I don’t use a pressure pump. Usually the downhill flow is
adequate. Unbeknownst to me, no water had
reached my roof in days. None.
Okay, so here’s the wild part of my story. How likely is it
that the very day my Big Tinaco is hooked up, my Little Tinaco runs dry? Figure
the odds on that one, will you.
Sondra Ashton
HWC: Looking out my back door
March 18, 2026
No comments:
Post a Comment