If it is yellow let it mellow, if it is brown, flush it down. Can you imagine seeing these words above the toilet you are about to use? I’m unsure of the translation in the countries of the Middle East, but you can be sure that potable water is rarely used to transport human waste in many places in the world. So, why would I not want to flush a bit of yellow urine down the drain with 1-3 gallons of potable water? Is it unsanitary? Will someone follow me at the toilet and drink from it? Or, do the molecules that enter the air from my urine, when inhaled by another, bring on illness. Is that what is called “yellow fever?” A little color in an otherwise white porcelain throne looks kind of nice to me.

Just because resources are cheap is no reason to waste them. The dollar value of a resource should be only one factor in the decision to make to use that resource; it is not the only factor. Just what does it say about human nature when we intentionally waste because “it’s cheap”? Recently I spent over $100.00 a night to stay in an old Holiday Inn in Phoenix, AZ where water is much more expensive and precious. I felt guilty taking a shower, particularly when there was no flow control or water restrictor on the shower head, and it spewed five or more gallons of potable water a minute onto my back. When I asked the assistant manager about the bountiful shower, she made it clear that guests want lots of hot water when they shower, and some still complain that the showers aren’t as nice as they would like. Oh well.

Did you realize that when you flush your waste in a typical toilet, the water used is the exact same water that you drink? Yes, we use filtered, chlorinated, and metered water to carry urine and fecal waste away. Our justification for this unusual practice is that water is cheap, readily available, and a resource that can be exploited for profit. In Greenville, SC where rainfall averages over 50 inches a year, we ought to be able to flush potable water—rig ht?

Well, we are in a drought now, the third in the last 15 years, and most of our water in Greenville is coming from Lake Keowee in Oconee County, 30 miles to the west. It is called inter-basin transfer; moving water from one watershed into another one, and not ever putting it back. Such practice goes on all the time in the arid Southwest, but why do we do it in Greenville, SC where we get so much rain? Why is Atlanta negotiating to buy water from the upstate of South Carolina? 

I took a whiz in the administrative bathroom at Furman last week. The flusher is right out of the 1960’s and takes over 3 gallons to evacuate. It was a tough choice for me.