When you live in a rural area there's no such thing as municipal water, or sewage for that matter. When the hydro goes out you have no water because you need hydro to run the well pump. Hydro's usually only out for a couple of hours, so it's no big deal.
When you haven't had a decent rain in weeks and the well goes dry you're in trouble. Water is something we all take for granted until we don't have any. Buying bottled water to drink is not so bad. Try filling up the bathtub with bottles of water. That's expensive. Then you have to boil enough of it so you don't freeze.
When the well goes dry you can't bathe, wash dishes, make coffee or tea, flush the toilet or cook supper. If you don't turn the well pump off in time you'll burn it out and have to buy a new one.
Then you have to prime the pump when there's enough water in the well. No water until the pump is primed. Unfortunately you need water to prime the pump. That's when you hope your neighbors well isn't dry and they can spare enough for you to fill some jugs to prime the pump.
We've learned to always keep jugs of water on hand for things like drinking, dishes cooking and flushing the toilet.
We no longer take water for granted. Every time I turn on my tap I pray water will come out of it.
We all need to take better care of this resource and not waste it.
Without water there would be no life on earth.
