It’s usually around this time of year, when the daylight creeps later into the evening and the birds dare to spend their mornings chirping, that it occurs to me that I have not had a glass of water in months. I’ve heard stories about how “you really do need to drink water in the winter” and “just because it’s cold doesn’t mean you can’t be dehydrated,” but I’m not sure I buy it. In the cold, dark months I find no problem or decreased vigor by hydrating almost entirely with coffee, cocoa, and beer. It works. It’s European.
Outside of the United States our infatuation with drinking water is scoffed at. At any restaurant in France, or Mexico, or Argentina a drink of water must be specifically requested, usually to the response, “¿sin o con gas?” Still or carbonated? It will invariably come in a bottle.
Of course the Europeans know that the purpose of a meal is to be enjoyed, and for the flavors, textures of the food and drink to come together and transcend the sum of their parts. Nothing is less inspiring to the palette than a tall glass of tap water and fist full of misshapen ice cubes. A meal is to be savored. Drinking water is a chore to be done out of obligation and a sense of “adulthood,” like making the bed or brushing your teeth.
And so this is why I am inspired by our government, for following the European lead and swearing off water all together. The current administration’s latest move to undermine our nation’s drinking water should inspire state and local governments to stop wasting money on “compliance” and “monitoring” and drill, baby, drill.
By fast tracking the Keystone XL Pipeline in spite of leaks and damage to the current Keystone Pipeline, allowing coal mines to dump ash in streams for disposal, and doubling down on hydraulic fracturing on public land, we’re right on track to catch up with visionaries across the pond. The leaders in Cape Town, SA have already renounced drinking water all together, effective in the next few weeks, and serve as a model for the rest of us.
The champions in Flint, Michigan have been pioneers in our new way of life right here on American soil. They’ve gone so far as to declare a state of emergency to get people off the stuff. Let them drink Coke, I say. Water is for the old ways. It doesn’t even have electrolytes.
Together, under this leadership we can all achieve a post water reality. We can bring back coal jobs just in time for them to be done by robots. We can drill in the arctic just in time for consumer vehicles to abandon the internal combustion engine. And we can reinvest in hydrofrakking and finally let the world know that we really mean it when we order an agua con gas.
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