I told her that:

Your story of the place water plays in the lives of village people all across Africa is moving to me. Your span of options to obtain water--and it's social function as well--give important education to those whose lives have been radically more privileged.

When I was in Botswana and Ghana in the 1970s for five years, I learned to head-carry water from communal taps, and the river. I could never manage to carry with no hands; I always had to support my bucket with one hand. The grace of women and children who did head carry their water continues to amaze me.

Clean, safe water is arguably the most basic need of any society. Unless we have that we can never have sustainable societies throughout the world. We can never halt the unnecessary deaths at all ages from diseases that could have been prevented. Even boiling unsafe water does not erase that risk.

For this year's Blog Action Day's topic on Climate Change, I asked Riehlife readers to share their observations and village wisdom. Here's a sampling. --JGR
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Xian Yeagan (Lake County, N. California...gonzo artist) sent this poem:
Climactic Chains
All Summer in California it was dangerously hot and dry.
Until last week.
Today it is cold and dark, immense rain.
A Change in the Whether I can believe in.

My father, Erwin A. Thompson, SW Illinois (from 94 years of observation and living):
Certainly we have had it!
Cold weather: In my Grandfather Riehl's day books he wrote of temperatures well below zero for extended periods of time. The Mississippi river froze so hard that they used it as a highway because it was smoother than the regular roads. Farmers used the ice to cross the river with their grain to take it to West Alton to market because they got a better price there. The gulls used to go south in the fall. One of his entries states: "The gulls are back!"

In my own lifetime: In the winter of 1935-36 it froze water lines thirty two inches deep. I stepped out on the porch one morning and thought it felt really warm. The thermometer stood exactly at zero! It had been more than twenty below.

Summer heat: Old records show temps of a hundred and eight, and holding there for some time. If it gets to a hundred the present population thinks the world is melting.

Dry weather: One time in the thirties it was so dry that the white oak trees died in the woods due to lack of moisture. We lost a beautiful white birch tree that had been a big tree all of my life due to the drought.
Quotes about the weather:
James Whitcomb Riley: "If God sends rain, then rain is my choice!"
Mark Twain: "Everybody talks about the weather, but nobody does anything about it!"
Van Booher: "Them weather men tell lies, sometimes!"

Curt Madison, Fairbanks, Alaska:
It is 60 F in Fairbanks. That's a couple degrees warmer than St. Louis today. Don't get me wrong, I like such balmy temperatures. But there is no snow. The dog trails are bare rocks and tree roots, plants and insects are confused, and we expect more degradation to trees as new disease moves north. We are basking in the warm interlude between enjoyment and catastrophe.

Arletta Dawdy, author of THE HUACHUCA TRILOGY, writes from Santa Rosa, California:

El Nino crept into California this week on anything but cat's paws. He came storming and yowling weeks early to warn of so much more to come this winter. HELP!

JJ Murphy:
Every day is Earth Day in my world.
Note: Read "How Green Are You?" and "My First Earth Day."

Hal Manogue:
Climate change is not the only change we are experiencing. Our consciousness is expanding in awareness. The natural changes that are taking place are physical manifestations of our consciousness changing its focus and expressions. It’s not a threat; it is an awakening.

Ernest Dempsey (Our Man in Pakistan):
If the messed up world for T. S. Eliot was a wasteland, for our generation in the neglected rural-converting-to-urban settings, it is a dryland. Gone are the days when my hometown Hangu (Pakistan’s northwest) received nature’s unbridled showers in both winter and summer. With a few exceptions, my recent memories of winter, over the past 5 years, show a dry season and the monsoon has grown stubbed. The winter is still cold and summers are extending each year by a significant proportion in time. But there is a dryness that foretells a slow but certain doom. Add to it the continuous plague of deforestation and imagine what we are doing to our environment. Most importantly, let us ask ourselves ‘do we deserve to expect Mother Nature to show us kindness while we continue to inflict wounds on its protective embrace?’

Jane Bruker, our neighbor on the hill next door:
My concern is all the misinformation that goes around and the people that point to "cold spells" or "hot spells" to prove their point one way or the other. I think we need to change the way climate change is marketed. It's patriotic to support climate change! If we said we need to cut carbon dioxide because it would be good for us; we need to stop using so much fossil fuel because it makes our country dependent on something that cannot be replaced; we need to show the world we are capable of the challenge then conservative extremists would have to support this issue or face humiliation. I really think that our tactic has to be one of "if you don't join us, you are supporting the enemy".

Mary Cunningham (of WOOF! Women Over the Age of Fifty):
My wish is for everyone to understand that "global warming" is not the issue. Cimate change; weather extremes that negatively affect humans and animals, alike.

MaryAnn (Bay Area, California):
Maldives ETD (Expected Time of Destruction): 2110. It is projected they will be under water (due to global warming) in 100 years. And this is just the beginning. Party on, sister, while the party is still to be had
Note: The Maldives is a country consisting "of 1190 is lands grouped into 26 natural atolls scattered over an area of 90,000 sq. km straddling the equator" off the southern tip of India.

Bobbi Linkemer, St. Louis:
Climate change: Is real. Ongoing. It may be too late to reverse it. It is exacerbated by greed, denial, and an absolute unwillingness to seek workable solutions.

Nancy Lippincott (our neighbor on Riehl Lane):
Climate change is a serious threat, and overpopulation plays a critical role. We know what effect carbon emissions are having on our planet and we know that global warming is the result of human activity. Therefore population growth leads to increased fossil fuel consumption by ever increasing numbers of people. If world population continues to grow at the current rate, it will rise 40% to 9.1 billion by 2050. As large sections of the global population become displaced or disadvantaged by climate change there will be more competition for scarce resources leading to social disruption and civil conflicts. Let's work toward reducing greenhouse gas emissions by developing renewable fuel sources. But if we don't recognize the need for population stabilization, we are not seeing the whole picture. Ceck out: The Population Institute, Population Connection (formerly ZPG), Numbers.com, Population-Environment Balance and Negative Population Growth.
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And now? A note from the Blog Action Day organizers:

Sign petition by clicking here.

Blog Action Day partnered with Al Gore's group the Alliance for Climate Protection to start a global online action addressed to the one country whose actions will most influence the future of our climate: the United States.

130 countries participated in Blog Action Day and climate change impacts us all. But more than any other country, action taken by the United States to limit greenhouse gases and build a clean energy economy is needed to achieve a sustainable solution to our global climate crisis.

As many of you know, this December world leaders will gather in Copenhagen to negotiate a global response to climate change. As a world leader in greenhouse gas pollution as well as clean energy technology, the United States needs to take bold and urgent action by implementing comprehensive clean energy policies to curb emissions.

Read my post on how it's "Easy to be green at the Carelton Hotel in San Francisco."
This year, Riehlife is proud to participate to support the cause of examining poverty to explore how it could be eradicated. Let's look at history today, and cast our minds back to the 1930s during the Great Depression. Let's listen to words of wisdom from my father, who lived through that time.

The Kind Of People That We Are
by Erwin A. Thompson

Dedicated to all of the people who shared the experience of living through The Great Depression, and especially to my friend, Sherman Bowen, who made the classic statement: "But if we had never been there, we wouldn't be the kind of people that we are!"

The family circle's broken, now.
We live in memory of other, fairer, younger days.
The days of used to be.
We see each other, now and then,
And childhood days we may recall
When we could buy a nickel's worth of ice‚
For homemade ice cream was the biggest thrill of all!
Hard luck. Hard times with money pinched and scant.
Cornmeal mush, and second handed clothes.

Tragedies, and broken dreams,
With failing banks, and mortgages foreclosed.
Courage staunch, put to the test,
And family ties were often strained.
Dust bowls when the winds did blow,
And mud balls when it rained!

"Wouldn't it be fine?" I asked,
"If just a bit of what we have today
We could have had, those pinched out years,
To ease our tortured way?"
For dollars that we spend so free,
A better use, by far!"
"But if we'd had," my friend replied,
"We wouldn't be the kind of people that we are!"