Water has always had an irresistible pull on my heart. When I was a kid it didn’t matter if it was a mud puddle, lake, or pond; if I could get at it, I was in it. Nothing, however, compared to my fascination with running water. I can sit and stare at a swiftly moving stream and become lost for hours. The way the water moves and rolls and twists and turns over the rocks and the roots of the trees have a hypnotic affect on me.

So it really is no wonder that much of the work I have done in my life has had ties in one way or another to water quality and supply especially. My wife and kids and I have had our own stream team here in Missouri for several years. It has always been a great family day when we go out to the creek and take our samples. It’s incredible when I can take a group of kids out to the stream from a local school and show them the amazing ecosystem of aquatic macroinvertabrates (water bugs) that live beneath the rocks of a stream bed.

What is even more satisfying is when they begin to understand that we all have one incredible thing in common. No matter where you live on this planet you are in a watershed. Kids get the idea of a watershed pretty quickly. They grasp how what they do at home can have impacts not only in their yard or driveway but many many miles downstream. And it is a big win for me when the kid’s parents grasp the concept as well.

What we all must do is realize that we all do live in a watershed and the actions we think are only impacting us right where we are are also having unintended consequences downstream.