The water woes continue in my town, and residents are still being asked to conserve as much water as we can. The water conservation effort is still mandatory, and we are still not allowed to use any public water that is not essential to survival.
Needless to say, it’s really no fun.
One of the worst parts is not being able to shower in my own home. Fortunately, my mama lives on the outside of the public water system with a well and has been letting us use the shower at her house. However, we still need to be very conscious of the amount of water we’re using for showers there as well, since her hot water tank is quite small. There are four of us, and three of them, so long showers aren’t really in the cards.
In an effort to save water for her, we’ve made every effort to take shorter showers. Much shorter showers!
A typical shower for each of us this week has gone a little something like this…
- Heat the bathroom. Trust me on this — shorter showers a la Navy style can be a little chilly. Fortunately, mama has a nice toasty heated bathroom!
- Turn on the water. Get all wet, including the hair and scalp.
- Turn off the water. This will help save water and lots of it!
- Lather up. Wash the hair first, then the rest of the body.
- Squeeze shampoo out of the hair. My daughter and I have longer hair, so it can take a bit to get all of that shampoo rinsed out. Squeezing out any excess shampoo lather can really cut rinsing time and save water.
- Shave. When you’re lathered all up, take some time to shave if necessary. Instead of using running water to rinse your razor, you can save water by collecting water in the tub or a container to rinse it.
- Turn on the water. Use it to rinse your hair and the rest of the soap.
I didn’t calculate it, but I’d guess that the four of us only used a couple of gallons of water each per shower.
Shorter showers aside, though, this little water crisis we’re in has really got me thinking about how much water we really do use on an average day and it shocks me. The long 10 minute showers now seem extremely excessive, and it makes me wonder how much it was costing us each month on our water bill.
I probably won’t continue to take a Navy shower when this all blows over, but I will certainly be a little more diligent about our water usage! If anything, it will be interesting to watch our water bill (hopefully) drop as we work harder to save water.
