If I have learned one thing living in - ahem - developing countries (their preferred terminology), it's that the things you want and need aren't always as accessible as they are at home. That doesn't mean that developing nations are deprived in any way, it just means that your hot water heater might break more often than it would living in New York City. It also means that the someone who can fix that heater for you is a tad harder to track down and hold accountable.
No matter how you slice it, some places come with their fair share of so-called "Third-World-Problems", and these are the decisions we make when we move or travel to faraway lands.
I experienced this re-revelation (one we tend to forget quickly when things are back to "normal") when I moved out of a friend's guest room and into the bottom floor of a large house shared with three other women. The former residence had proved full of nuisances for which my first-world palate was unaccustomed: shoddy internet, no washing machine, a less-than-spotless kitchen and - the greatest tragedy of all - hot water that came and went as it pleased. Now, most of these detractions I can live with, and despite being as internet-dependent as the next person, I would gladly trade time on Facebook for my daily hot shower.
Anyone who knows me well knows that I appreciate having a space to myself where I can retreat from the world as well as other people; having been deprived of that privacy as well as my scrub-and-soak time, I was not the happiest of campers. These, among other reasons (such as proximity to work), led me to go looking for a new abode to call my own.
And after I found one, how I longed for the month to end so I could venture forth, unpack my towel and rack up a nice, high water bill.
To my utmost dismay, I was instead greeted into my new residence by a stream of frigid water. How haughtily it poured from the shower head, refusing to warm as it had promised. "Why, God, why???" I cried aloud, falling to my knees. "Will I never enjoy the warmth of a steamy hot shower again?" (Okay…perhaps an exaggeration, but I was pretty pissed).
I knew all I had to do was tell my new housemates (who lived upstairs) about my predicament. However, two things held me back: first, I wasn't quite confident in my ability to explain the situation properly, what with my sub-par Spanish and their lack of English; second, when I had had similar problems in my previous living arrangement, my concerns had gone unnoticed and it had only created tension. Hoping to avoid a repeat offense, I bit my tongue and alternated employing the jump-in-jump-out method with the occasional hot shower at friend's apartment - all the while praying to the hot water gods to forgive whatever sin I had committed and magically restore my showers to me.
Alas, my memo to the water gods must have gotten lost in the shuffle and the hot water never came back. So, after three weeks, I plucked up the courage (and a translator) and brought my issue forth to the powers-that-be. And what happened? The girl apologized, said the heater must be broken and that they would bring someone in to fix it the next day. And they did.
Problem solved, just like that. I've had hot water ever since and now my biggest showering problem is finding that elusive balance between too hot and too cold.
I suppose the moral of the story is twofold. Not only should we all be aware of our self-destructive procrastination, but we would be doing ourselves a big favor by forgoing the concept of "I'll get to it tomorrow." Having a cold shower might not be the end-all and be-all of lifetime hardships, but if you can do something about it, then why put it off? A task easier said than done, of course, but to at least put forth the effort to change our hardwired habits is a start. And who knows? Maybe when you finally get around to that epic list of "Things I Want To Do" something great and unexpected will come out of it.
In addition to the anti-procrastination advice, I suggest this: take advantage of what you have when you have it. You never know when the proverbial hot water heater will break down, and the chances we lose rarely come back for a do-over. So just go out and do it: enjoy that hot shower while it's there; take that new job even though it scares the hell out of you; tell the person you like how you feel about them (unless they're with someone else - don't be that guy). In most cases, we genuinely have nothing to lose and - cliche alert - everything to gain.
But who am I to lecture you on promptness and carpe diem? After all, I told myself this post would be up three weeks ago.
