Curtis and Marc's heavy burden

After two lovely sunny (yet sometimes frigid) weeks, the rain is officially back. Along with them comes the awesome responsibility of keeping our running water flowing. This means almost every time it it rains heavily, a couple people (basicly always Curtis and Marc) must hike up the waterfall to our water source and fix it when air or debris get in the lines. This has happened two times in the past 24 hours. One day about a month ago I had been in the mood to write after one of these incidents, and have been looking for the opportunity to use it. Perfect timing.
I wake up this morning to Eowyn calling for her breakfast. I roll over and check the clock as I grab her out of her bed. 7:50 - pretty good. Last time I was up was at 4:30 for her midnight snack. I get back in bed and assume the position to start feeding her. A minute later I hear a familiar tapping at the door. “Curtis, it’s Derek.....Curtis get up, Derek’s at the door.” He gets up wanders over, and opens the door a crack. “Hey wanna go for a morning hike?” Curtis looks at him blankly. “I just felt like going for a hike this morning - hey, could you get me a glass of water?” Now I found this very random, yet it didn’t really phase me because that’s what we have come to expect from our dear brother. It apparently didn’t phase Curtis either, because he made his way to the bathroom to fetch our early visitor his H2O. He turns on the tap and....nothing. Oh. That’s what he meant. How clever. Curtis walks back over to hear Derek’s cheesy laugh. “Ha, ha...can you give me a few minutes?” In other words, water is out, so they’ve got to hike up to our water source at the top of a little waterfall. At least Derek and Curtis are around this time. The water was out around new years and they spent 6 days without water. Running water that is, for this is northern California, it is the winter, and oh is there water. I try to look forward to the summer, because I know that because of the excessive rainfall, it will be more beautiful. Things will stay greener longer, and the river will stay higher with less algae growth. Even though there is no water now, it doesn’t really concern me, because I know they can fix it. We had a little problem with our water in our cabin recently. The pressure was way down, so you could hardly take a shower, which meant I would have to lug all my stuff to a different shower. In the rain. And oh yeah, where am I supposed to put my kids? Well long story short, Curtis the handyman fixed it. But he did come out all muddy and bleeding (just a little). You come to realize how dependent you’ve become on conveniences in this country. So the whole time I’m frustrated about the water being low ( it was VERY low) I’m also frustrated with myself for not being tougher, or more thankful for what we do have. I mean people in some other countries don’t even have running water or electricity (something that hasn’t gone out this winter which I really am thankful for). Anyway, it’s winter, and it’s okay. I have two beautiful children and a great husband.