Watery Wondering...

Do you bathe or shower? Or do choose a method depending upon your mood?

For decades I would shower. Not quick jump-in-jump-out showers that get the job done with a minimum of resources used. I'd often stand in the shower letting the water run over me until I used up all the hot water in the house. Because water lets me think. It must be because my horoscope chart is strongly centered in water signs.

A couple years ago I realized that I do not give myself permission to do certain things: contemplate quietly or just read a book. That's when I discovered that if I made myself take a bath (and allow myself to stay in the water until it cools to something less than body temperature), I have a time and place where I give myself to do those things forbidden the rest of the day.

So now I bathe.

Normally I stand in the tub for a couple minutes, waiting for initial cold water to mix with the eventual hot water, then slide down under the surface. I start reading as soon as I step onto the fiberglass surface. (the spouser says it's quite a picture.. a woman standing naked in a nearly empty tub with her nose stuck in a book. Whatever...) I get about 30 minutes of reading before I must scrub myself new. I remain sitting in the tub as the water drains then dry myself off and dress.

After, I'm often drawn back to my computer to write. I do most of my blogging after a bath. And sometimes, when I'm dry, dry, dry for something to write, I find myself drawn to the tub as if it were my muse.

Lately, I haven't been reading in the bath. I've been thinking about who I was once-upon-a-time, how I've lost that gal, and what parts of her I wish to reclaim. Instead of leaving the bath just physically fresher, I find I'm exiting it with a better understanding of who the gal is beneath the skin.

It's an interesting idea.

I'll be sharing it with you over the next few days.

I also blog at: Deb's Daily Distractions and BlogHer on Mondays and Saturdays.