Grateful for Infrastructure

Nov 25, 2021
Grateful for Infrastructure
There's so much to be grateful for by living in a first world country in this day and age. The main thing that's often taken for granted is the underlying infrastructure behind our daily lives:
  • Running water
    • We don't have to go outside and pump water from a well every day for everything we use it for: drinking, cooking, washing, bathing.
      It's also temperature-controlled to get it as warm or cool as we like.
  • Supermarkets and restaurants
    • Immediate access to whatever you want to eat, from foreign lands or out-of-local-season. No need to do all the farm work yourself, can just pick up and buy what you want. For most Americans, diet is a privilege.
  • Electricity
    • And all the appliances and gadgets that use it: computers, phones, TVs, video game systems, refrigerators, washers & dryers, ovens, dishwashers, air conditioners, heaters
  • Transportation
    • With roads, cars, and airplanes, we're not really limited to traveling to any place we want to.
  • Structures
    • From modern houses to skyscrapers are architectural feats. Having so many working parts fit together in one place, to enormous artificial spaces that make more room in tightly-packed cities by going up high into the air.
  • Internet
    • This has become an integral part of everyday life. There's a sense of unease when we don't have online access. It's how we connect with the rest of the world. We can even have face-to-face live calls with someone halfway around the world, a feat our ancestors could only dream of. Soon, with the rise of VR, we will be able to experience their presence even more.
  • Plastic (added Dec 13, 2021)
    • From plastic bags to storage containers for food and other items to water bottles, these are convenient things that our ancestors would have loved yet we rarely think about. They had to manually weave baskets or construct holding containers for storage and carrying.