I spend a lot of time thinking about water.  Every time I see it go down the drain when I could have turned it off sooner, I feel bad.  Something I read some years back, made me realize just how much water is wasted by people in highly-developed countries.  In some other countries, where water is scarce due to being in the desert and/or lack of rain, water is precious and treated as such.

I read a story about a woman who was poor and lived in a region of the South Africa where the dry times were spent waiting for the rains to come.  She was able to get a job and rent a place that wasn’t much more than a room and where she shared a tap with the owner who watched her suspiciously when she got water from the outdoor faucet, always warning her not to take too much.  But she was so happy, so grateful for that tap. Gratitude for our abundance of water is rarely discussed in my circles. I think that it is something that we take for granted and like many of our blessings, we don’t even think about it at all.

But I think that it should be something we think about.  And of course, we should also be grateful for it. It is part of being human that we don’t consider things to be valuable, until they are gone.  It is a far better thing to learn to be grateful while we enjoy the benefits of these blessings while we have them, and not just when they are no longer there.

Water, is perhaps the most valuable thing on earth.  We literally can’t live without it. Humans are 60% water.  We can live three weeks without food, but only 4 or 5 days without water.  I have never been in a situation where water was unavailable to me. I do not think that I am the only one.

So, what’s my point?  Don’t waste water, ever, if you can help it.  Appreciate it every time you take a drink, take a shower, clean, cook, wash clothes, do dishes, water your plants and lawn and etc.  Gratitude is, in itself, a blessing. Thank God for it. Appreciate it. Don’t pollute it. Support organizations that help people in places all over the world where it is scarce, to find ways of harvesting it and for providing better ways of delivering it to the people.  This is my aspiration. Might it be yours, too?