Lauren Rothman and her partner rented a house in Oaxaca City with a large 10,000-liter-capacity cistern—and despite that, and although they took daily measures to curb their water consumption, their cistern routinely ran dry before the next water delivery, leaving them without water for days at a time. More than 22 million people in Mexico City could soon face a complete water shortage, and millions more around the country deal with frequent droughts and water shortages. Is it time to rethink our relationship with water?