[Lake Norman, SC]

I WANNA BE SEDATED

     So you go to the doctor because you have a nasty cold that you just can’t shake and she gives you a prescription for antibiotics and you take them for ten days and your cold goes away and you’re happy. Unfortunately, for your neighbors who share the same drinking water sources and waste water treatment plant (WWTP), your body didn’t absorb the entirety of that prescription and some of it just passed through your system and into the toilet so you flush, and off it goes to the WWTP where they are in the business of cleaning and clarifying and “slurry-ing” and reducing the waste to sludge and sending a purified water back to your tap. Or maybe you took your birth control pill again today, but not all of that stays with you so the WWTP gets the extra estrogen or progesterone which it also can’t process — the same way our bodies can’t process it all — and punts the leftover mess to the river, and since the earth has to clean Her own water, that doesn’t bode too well for the ground or surface water. Pharmaceuticals are not something the earth is used to absorbing, so, unsure of what to do, She just lets it pass. Generally, She can handle such things unless her cycle’s disrupted, or overloaded, or incapacitated, and this probably qualifies for all three.

Get your chill on here…