The baby and the bath water.

The trade I wound up in
is funny for a multitude of reasons:
the slapstick references
to the laying of the pipe, the plumbers' cracks
and the infamous Law of Gravity
so delicately stated in the general direction
of every poor apprentice at one point or another--
"Shit rolls downhill, Kid."

But there are other amusing morsels
more specific to my own
"Oh fuck, how'd I end up with this job?" scenario.
I am paid to make fluids, be they liquids
or gasses, go places. Pipefitting is essentially
a form of transportation industry if you think about it.
Get said substance from Point A to Point B
(with as few fittings and lengths of pipe
as possible in order to save the boss money
thus securing your job in the company).
That's the conclusion I've come to over these years
and yes, I've thought about it.
I am well aware that water travels to places
where people use it, then returns via a different system
to be processed by man or nature or both
before being used again.
This was not always so, however.

Growing up they always told us
to save water. Parents, teachers and other
authority figures would go out of their meddling ways
to express the importance of shutting off the water
while brushing your teeth and limiting shower time.
Electricity is invisible so a child assumes
it will always come out of the wall
whenever the switch is flicked, but water
you can see, touch, hear, smell, taste.
Water I could run out of growing up
or at least that's what they told me
and like the fool that I was and am
I believed them.

It was a genuine fear of mine, a post-apocalyptic nightmare
not suitable for TV movie, Broadway show
or unreasonably long Kevin Costner film:
The day the Earth went dry.
I can honestly say that one of my fondest memories
of my elementary school career was the day that
I learned about the Water Cycle in science class.
There was a detailed explanation of the endless
sequence of events, complete with labeled diagram
that assured me that my paranoia was unwarranted
and I could sleep better at night again
assuming GI Joe was still winning his war
against Cobra Commander in my imagination.
Yes, I always overanalyzed this much.

Since then I've learned that everything else
is a cycle, as well; everything returning eventually
be it through a sewer pipe or a cloud pissing acid rain
or a long overdue letter or a surprise phone call at 3 a.m.
and if this Law of Nature, this boomerang, isn't reason enough
for you to return then we're all more fucked than we thought.

And yeah, I still turn off the water while brushing my teeth.
I'd lie and say it's out of habit, but part of me
is still skeptical about that Water Cycle business
and the responsibility that comes with its knowledge
diagram or no diagram
because there's another Law that supercedes the rest:

"Believe none of what you hear and half of what you see."