More on water.

June 13, Pittsburg.

This is what I like about living on the road, living in a circus: the necessary thrift, everything is counted thus everything becomes precious - but it was always precious, somewhere down the road to modernity we just forgot it. Water is but one thing that you learn to use wisely. Water tanks, both clean and used, are small and emptying them is always costly; you have to find a dumping place and then find the time to dump on the way to the next destination, and there isn't always a site close by. Wasting water is not an option. You close the tab when you brush your teeth (I never understood why it was needed to have the water running while you do that; the energy to turn it off too much to ask?) but also when you wash your hands, between soaping up and rinsing, or the dishes; toilets don't use much water as they don't have a fresh-water tank attached. We still use a lot of water compared to a family in Africa, but a hell of a lot less than your average North American household.
Electricity is just as precious. The generator is shut off at night , and most people do not have their own private one to turn on. It's usually back on around nine, and because the heating system doesn't work in my old trailer, on a cold morning the temperature is the same inside as it is outside, and this morning it was hot. You learn to cope, and to view electric light as what it is, miraculous, and costly, just like pretty much everything else in our sophisticated, technology-driven world this side of the North/South divide.