Unfiltered

This is my view every morning.

Atop the Pico de Orizaba sits the Glaciar de Jamapa -- Mexico’s largest glacier. It is a beautiful sight to behold in the mornings -- a special treat to which to awaken.  Most mornings, by 10:00 am, the Pico has begun to disappear, engulfed in a sea of clouds. I love living in the cloud forest! I enjoy the volcano until it fades, and then look forward to seeing it again the next day.

Yesterday, I noticed that my drinking water was getting low and so set out to get more.  Unlike in Mexico’s cities, I have access to clean water right here on my own land! The water travels to me from the Gulf of Mexico, via the clouds and the glacier on the Pico de Orizaba (also known by its Nauatl name Citlatltepetl).  The water in the springs and streams come to me pure and fresh. I drink it without adding chlorine. There is no processing plant or filtration system.

I brought my empty 5-gallon bottle through the forest to a place where a crystal clear spring bubbles to the surface, creating a small waterfall. We have set up a small tube to deliver the water to me in a more concentrated form.

To collect my life-sustaining beverage, I climbed down the bank into a pool of icy cold spring water. Having forgotten to wear my waterproof boots, I had to go in barefoot. Once situated, I placed the mouth of my bottle beneath the tumbling water. I use a single filtration system – a small sieve to keep bugs and leaves from flowing in.

Once filled, I pulled myself and my bucket up onto the bank, putting my shoes back on.

Mission accomplished, almost.  Ahead of me lay a 15-minute walk back through the forest to the house. The big bottle is extremely heavy – just over 40 pounds! I should have brought my wheelbarrow, but I didn’t.

I was reminded of a day in Boston when I bought too many groceries and tried to make it home with two paper bags. First one handle ripped, then the other. Initially, I carried one like a baby on my hip, then I tried doing that for both. By the time I got to my house, I was walking one bag a little ways, leaving it on the curb and coming back for the other one, only to start the process again for the next 20 steps. So it was with the water: I had to take many breaks and reorganize my posture several times. But at last, I made it home.

Now I have clean pure delicious water for another few weeks!

Within three kilometers, our beautiful stream/river (the Rio Citlalapa) will reach the town of Huatusco. There, the city’s raw sewage is dumped directly into the river. In an instant, the elixir of life is transformed from crystal clear and drinkable, to toxic and gross. Mexico’s current strategy for dealing with human waste is poisoning our fresh water supply.

It has become so accepted that ground-water is contaminated that it sometimes surprises me that I can drink the unfiltered water straight from the land. It’s a reminder of how accustomed I have become to our human habit of dirtying everything and then having to clean it again! We live in a world where having to purify water in order to drink it seems normal. How did we come to live this way?

Sometimes, I think my hectic lifestyle in the United States has created similar expectations for my internal state. Without my daily yoga class and meditation (systems of purification), how could I not be frantic and stressed? Through the relentless pace that I lived, I worked myself up and then had to insert a personal filtration system to calm myself down again. Living in a slower way sometimes appears ridiculous, even impossible. And yet, it’s a healing experience to live in a different way for a time.

For today, I will remember that being calm and present is my natural state. I will give myself permission to take time for myself, and savor the awesome miracle of drinking pure spring water, straight from the heart of Mother Earth.