Clean And Pure

The Rebirth of Venus  by Kneil Melicano

Bathroom Sink in Phoenix, Arizona 

Most bottled water is secured or purchased from a source, city water supply, or a spring and filtered of all that is not two hydrogen atoms attached to an oxygen atom.  At this point, it is pure, free of minerals, bacteria, flavor, and healing properties.  Basically, this water's connection to its place on Earth is removed.

Minerals are added back into the water to make it taste the way we think it ought to taste, sweeter? cooler? .(..stronger? thinner? taller? cleaner? quieter?)  Then it is put into a plastic bottle. covered with more plastic, labeling it pure, dated and sourced for our convenience.  Then it is marketed to the public.  We buy it, drink it, and discard the marketing.  In truth, we have had a drink of water and paid for the marketing, processing, transportation, chemicals, legal process of procuring the water, upkeep of vehicles and equipment, worker in the bottling plant, the creation of plastic from fossil fuels, getting the fossil fuels from the ground, processing the fossil fuels into compounds used for plastic, the natural gas and coal to power the plant that bottles the water, the glue, the paper to wrap on the bottle, the design of the bottle and the marketing of the shape of the bottle best suited to our taste, and often for the refrigeration of the water and the management of the dispensing machine.  Now, that's expensive!

Going to the store to buy bottled water is getting more complicated, there is water from NewZealand, California, Arkansas, Fiji, Hawaii, Iceland, Ashland, Oregon.  And the water is now guaranteed to be naturally alkaline, since folks realized water has properties in it other than just pure water.  Since fresh drinking water is becoming scarce, the value of it is going up, (according to the market).  All water is different, because it lives in and on Earth, our bodies, and in our very unique bioregions.  When these unique qualities are remembered, I wonder if we will become connoisseurs of each special source. Like drinking fine wines, they will carry ancient stories of place.

This is the beautiful part of the story.  The ancient story of water is that it is believed to carry special healing powers when one drinks it from a specific spring at its source.  Lithia Springs, in Ashland, Oregon is one example, one of millions.  Many of these healing springs are also sacred, which in turn became waters named after Catholic Saints.  Going to the land where the water springs forth is no longer a special journey.  The journey is the one we take to the grocery store, the quickie mart, or the vending machine. Perhaps some day these hermetically sealed waters will be a collector's item, like fine wine.  When all the water in springs and clean water sources are sucked out of the Earth and rivers, piped, purified, bottled, trucked, and stored for those who can afford it, water will truly be a commodity.

What has changed is that these waters are being displaced.  Over time, the joy of drinking a special kind of water has become a very damaging form of consumption.  How?

Waters are displaced because they go through our sewer system (from our bodies), usually in large urban areas and don't make it back into the septic system, aquifer, or water bioregion they came from.  The water isn't waiting in a reservoir for us to turn on the faucet, it is being taken out of a system far away all day every day and put into bottles and trucks and taken to where the people are waiting to buy it when ever we get thirsty.  It's sitting in storage at big warehouses, on trucks, and in grocery stores.  When we need water, it is there for us.  Meanwhile, fresh drinking water supplies in towns and cities all over the world are being over pumped, over used, and over priced due to scarcity and private ownership.  Perhaps when the market changes, the price of warehoused bottled water will change.  When availability changes, the price will change.  Considering that we all need water every day and knowing there are extremely impoverished people in our country, this is a growing emergency.  If public drinking water supplies are not protected and shared, the only clean drinking water could be what is in the bottles.  Should impoverished people have to wait for the wealthy to give them water or should we all have access to clean drinking water, no matter what?

"The environmental impact of the country’s obsession with bottled water has been staggering. Each day an estimated 60 million plastic water bottles are thrown away. Most are not recycled. The Pacific Institute has estimated 20 million barrels of oil are used each year to make the plastic for water bottles." -Amy Goodman, Democracy Now 

Let's get straight to the point here.  

Please drink water from our water systems.  Vote for laws that discourage profiteering from our water.  Look for ways to declare our water sources a community commons.  

Bottles for recycling, Portland, OR. by Glee 2015

When I hear declarations like this, I find a million reasons NOT to change.  Consider this...The fabricated fear of drinking city water, or getting bacteria from a drinking fountain is a first world problem.  There are plenty of places in the world where drinking the water can mean guinea worm disease, cholera, or dysentery.  Not so much in US cities.

Drink from the tap, bring a cup, find a drinking fountain.  Not for yourself, but for everyone, for your world family.  Keep water in its region, and help keep that water a part of the place where you live by buying foods grown and processed locally.  When we buy fruits, vegetables, drinks, juices, grains, products, we buy the clean water that was used to produce and process them.

What can you do now? You can get to know your neighbors.  Your neighbors likely live in the same watershed, over the same aquifers, and hopefully share the same water utility. Have a watershed party in you neighborhood.  Drink some water together. When we know our neighbors, we realize we are all in this together.

Learn and do:  Create A Rain Garden
                        Maude Barlow at World Social Forum
                        Know Your Watershed
                        Friendly Water For The World