The toilet question nobody wants to ask

At 6:50 this morning the cold tap gave about two seconds of water and then air. By seven it was dry, so the 26 litres I counted last night are the whole supply. I found a 20-litre bucket in the garage at 8:15, and most of the day went into it.

Six litres a flush

Our toilet uses 6 litres on a full flush and 4.8 on the small one. At six litres a flush, eight flushes a day is 48 litres. I had 26, so flushing was never a rationing problem. One ordinary day of it would have taken the supply and the tank.

Before the pressure died I flushed twice without thinking. That water came off the mains, not out of my 26 litres, which was luck and not judgment. The tank still holds about 6 litres from the last fill, and I shut the supply at the wall so it stays there. I have not decided whether that water is for drinking or for one flush.

The drain goes into a sewer I cannot see, and my basement is the low point on the street if the sewage has nowhere to go. A toilet I can flush is a toilet I will flush. At 8:15 I put the lid down on the tank.

What went in the bucket

A 20-litre bucket, one black garbage bag folded over the rim, lid on between uses. One bag, not two: a doubled bag catches at the fold and tears. It had held driveway salt, so I rinsed it.

The cover material is the part I nearly skipped. A part-bag of sawdust in the garage, about 3 kg, left from the summer I rebuilt the back step. Two cups after each solid use. At roughly 50 g a cup that is 60 cups, four uses a day for 15 days. Kitty litter does the same job.

Solids and urine go in different containers. Urine goes into a 4-litre jug with a funnel, because a wet bucket smells and a dry one mostly does not. The jug goes on the far garden bed. Paper goes in with the solids.

Hands decide whether anyone gets sick. There is a 1-litre measuring cup on the cistern and a bar of soap on a saucer. Wet hands, 200 ml poured over them, soap for twenty seconds, 200 ml to rinse, 0.4 litres a wash. The bucket is not what makes anyone sick. A hand on the rim and then a piece of bread is the whole mechanism.

Two mistakes in the first hour. I put the bucket in the bathroom because that is where a toilet goes. It is the smallest room in the house, with no window and a fan that needs electricity. I also used a dusting of sawdust instead of a layer. By 1 p.m., six hours in, the smell had reached the landing. The fix was 15 cm of sawdust and the lid down every time. The bucket moved to the landing by the back door, which is 6 °C and has a door that opens.

I carried it through the front hall at 8:15 with the bag already in it, in daylight, past the window. That is the part I did not expect. Not the smell and not the work. The shame was that after eleven years in this house I could not come up with anything better than a salt bucket on a landing. The woman two doors down has a gas cartridge heater and a wind-up torch. I noticed the shame, did not have a use for it, and put the lid on.

A day with no hum

The fridge is silent and I keep hearing the clock in the hall. At 2 p.m. I stood in the kitchen and listened to it, and to the dog breathing on the mat. That was the whole noise in the house.

I made a joke at lunch about saving money on the water bill. It landed badly. Then we had ten minutes about a saucepan. She had used 300 ml to rinse it, I said something about the 300 ml, and it stopped being about water. Neither of us apologised. The pot is still on the stove.

By three there was nothing to organise, so I sorted the toolbox twice. The dog followed me up and down the stairs until he gave up and lay across the landing doorway, which is where he has decided the bucket is his responsibility. He does not move for a person carrying a bucket, so I stepped over him six times before dark. He drank his litre in nine seconds, then stood at the back door looking at the snow.

I did the month arithmetic on purpose. Better now than at 3 a.m. At 8.6 litres a day, thirty days is 258 litres. I have 22. Melting snow costs fuel I do not have, the car has a quarter tank, and I do not know where the nearest water is. I did not solve it. I wrote 258 on the card and went back to the bucket.

Where the four litres went

I started at 26 litres and ended at 22. Here is the whole of the 4.

• 1.5 L drinking and cooking — two pots of tea, oats, rice.
• 1.0 L to the dog.
• 0.8 L handwashing, four pours of 200 ml. Four when it should have been ten.
• 0.4 L washing, two washcloths at 200 ml each.
• 0.3 L cleaning the bucket rim, the lid, and the bathroom floor.

The dog is in the number now. He is 30 kg and takes about a litre a day, so the house runs at 8.6 litres: 7.6 for two adults and 1 for him. I wrote 8.6 on an index card above the jugs, then did the division properly: 22 divided by 8.6 is 2.5.

Two and a half days. Not five. I had been dividing by 4, which is the number I was using, not the number the house needs.

That is the mistake I made today, worse than the bucket. I filled the dog's bowl at 8 a.m. because he asked for it. Then I made tea and did not drink water until 2 p.m. Between us we took 1.5 litres, 0.75 each, in a house at 9 °C with the furnace fan dead. By mid-afternoon I had a headache behind my eyes and my urine was the colour of apple juice. At noon I wrote "fine" on the card.

What changed tonight: two 750 ml bottles, filled at 7 a.m., one each, both empty by dark.

The wash water went into the 20-litre pail, not down the drain. 1.2 litres in a trap sits there and sours. The pail goes to the far bed once a day, downhill, and sits there under a lid until spring.

After the candle was lit I sat on the stairs and prayed for the woman two doors down. It was the first time since the storm. I have lived two doors from her for eleven years and I do not know her first name. I know which window is her kitchen. I started with "look after her". Then it turned into an apology about the bucket. Then I asked not to be the one who has to carry her down her stairs, which is not a good thing to ask. I do not know whether any of it counts or whether anyone was listening. I did it again at ten and it was just as clumsy.

What I should have had on day zero

• A new 20-litre bucket with a lid that seals, not the salt bucket from the garage.
• 20 kg of sawdust or non-clumping kitty litter. My 3 kg is 15 days at four uses a day.
• A second 4-litre jug and a funnel, so urine never goes in the solids bucket.
• Two 750 ml bottles with a name on each, so the day's drinking is measured and not remembered.
• The 6 litres in the toilet tank counted on the card, or the supply valve shut before the pressure died.