A Few Thoughts on Showers

Today, dear readers, I'd like to invite you into my shower.

Not literally. Figuratively, not literally. Oh god. That's weird. You're weird. Stop thinking like that, that's weird. Man.

Anyway, it's clear that showers are inherently awkward. First of all - obviously - you're naked, and you're probably still half asleep. You're bound to screw something up on the way in, be it a quick stumble on the way out of bed or (as I did this morning) a wayward arm swing sending your toothpaste into your toilet. At least it was almost empty anyway.

Then, you have to stand there naked or close to it, no doubt regretting leaving your bed and its warmth, as you wait for the water to heat up. Once it's judged to be a sufficient temperature, you hop in and cringe as - guess what? - you're doused in water. You can barely see from your hair flopped over your eyes, and the damn water isn't hot enough anymore. You turn it up slightly and stand there a minute because you're still half asleep and attempting to blink into reality. If you're like me, you have music playing from your laptop and are nodding your head to "Walking On The Sun" by Smash Mouth, reenacting "Let It Go" from Frozen, or otherwise jamming to whatever song is on.

You got used to the water temperature again; better turn it up a little more again. This obviously doesn't apply to some of you, but around now is the point at which I remember that I do, in fact, have a tattoo, and that it's been there for a year - and damn, it looks cool. After some quick self-admiration and another slight temperature increase, you realize that you'd better get around to actually cleaning yourself. You drop a too-big amount of shampoo into your hand and immediately regret your carelessness. Those bottles cost like $5.95, man.

By now, the room has filled with steam and you've incrementally ventured about three-quarters of the way up the temperature dial. Regardless, you still turn it up a little more because, screw it, it's eight in the morning and if you're going to be up at this ungodly hour, you're going to turn your bathroom into a sauna. Because that's adulthood, damn it. If you don't turn your bathroom into a sauna yourself, no one else is going to do it for you.

Of course, the soaping and cleaning of oneself then commences. This in itself is an incredibly awkward thing to describe in any level of detail, and so I will not. Apologies.

So, you're probably about three songs in at this point and standing in a vision-impairing field of hazy steam. You probably should be getting out soon, but "Semi-Charmed Life" just came on and you woke up fifteen minutes early anyway, so you belt out those timeless words that you barely know or understand the meaning of. Finally, at some point around the end of the song, you regretfully turn the water off and venture out into the steam-field. You grasp for your towel and give yourself a noogie that older brothers could only dream of as you dry your hair.

Then, once you've put on boxers and gotten a bit more reacquainted with your surroundings, you stand in front of the sink and stick a vibrating plastic object in your mouth and vigorously scrub your teeth with it and some minty cleaning agent. You spit frequently and in the color of a shamrock shake during this, and some toothpaste inevitably ends up sticking to the sink, defying you in the face of the cleaning you just did the other day.

For me, the music has been going this whole time. We've generally made it into "Teenage Dream" territory on the playlist by now, and are belting it out as you walk in circles around your room getting dressed. You put a dab of shaper in your hair, tousle it around a bit, then give up and accept your mediocre hairstyle. You grab your wallet, keys and phone and are finally ready for the day - that is, until you run back inside to grab the backpack you somehow managed to forget. How did you manage to forget your backpack on your way to school?

Showers are weird, man.