This morning I indulged my inner frugal sybarite with a hot, hot soak. Unlike the man in the song below, I don’t limit baths to the end of a tiring day. Sometimes a good dunk is the right solution for mid-morning writer’s block or midday slump.
I pop an already-cold Diet Coke into the freezer for 15 minutes to create little fizzy icebergs or fix myself a glass of iced tea. Then I lower myself into water that’s as hot as I can stand.
Steam floats in the air, my toes crinkle and the cold drink provides a shivery shock, the perfect foil to the boil of the tub. As soon as the water cools even a little I hit the hot-water tap again.
Most of the time I rush from the shower to the day’s chores, or stumble from the shower to the bed. Tub ablutions are relatively rare, which makes them more luxurious.
They’re great attitude adjustments, too, as Flanders and Swann can attest:
I don’t sing in the tub, but I do talk. Yes, really.
Mostly that’s talking through the articles on which I’m currently working: How much material do I have, whether it’s enough to start writing, how I should start the article* and how I might organize and complete it.
Sometimes I talk through the rest of my day: How much more of it to give to work, whether I should go straight to my indoor walk once I’m dried and dressed, if I should write furiously for an hour and then steal half an hour away to make a special dessert. Or maybe I should e-mail my daughter or call a friend.
Other times I just soak, making a specific effort not to think about work or cooking or family or friends. Or anything. Hydrotherapy is my chance to stop thinking at all, if I choose.
FOMO or guilt
Modern life does not afford many chances to step off the treadmill. Work (and maybe a side hustle), commuting, family, chores, social media, community work and hobbies rob us of relaxation and, too often, of real rest.
At times we not only can’t step off, we find ourselves upping the speed. Workouts! The holidays! Instagram! Youth sports! I can sleep when I’m dead!
Technically we can choose to jettison certain items. But 21st-century FOMO or good old-fashioned guilt nibble around the margins. Am I gaining weight? Shouldn’t I have made cookies from scratch the way my mom did? Am I losing social media followers? Why can’t I manage to get to the soccer game on time? I’m a bad person who doesn’t DESERVE sleep…!
Allow yourself a bit of a back-off. Use some of that Internet time on a walk or bike ride. Sitting too much is not good for your current or future health.
When you’re pressed for time, slice-and-bake will fill the bill. So will buying pre-baked cookies, or skipping holiday sweets altogether. Plenty of other treats will find you during this time of year.
The world won’t end if you don’t photograph and share every restaurant meal or walk on the beach. In fact, some of your friends may be grateful that there’s less to take in and, more to the point, fewer chances for them to feel guilty about what they’re not doing.
Just showing up to kids’ sports events is, in my opinion, plenty supportive. Should your working day or traffic or anything else keep you from being there in the opening minutes, explain this matter-of-factly and move on. Your kids will, too.
An unattainable fantasy?
Nobody has all of it together, despite what social media and blogs and magazines would have you believe. Please don’t assume that people truly live this way 24-7. How much of your life do you want to give over to chasing an unattainable fantasy?
The comedian Margaret Cho did a pointed bit about how much time she wasted feeling that she was overweight and therefore unlovable:
“So from the age of 10, I became anorexic, and then bulimic, and then stayed that way for about 20 years, until one day I just said, ‘Hey, what if this is it? What if this is just what I look like and nothing I do changes that?
“So how much time would I save if I stopped taking that extra second every time I look in the mirror to call myself a big fat fuck? How much time would I save if I just let myself walk by a plate-glass window without sucking in my gut and throwing back my shoulders? How much time would I save?’
“And it turns out I save about 97 minutes a week. I can take a pottery class.”
Here’s my suggestion: Spend some of your own 97 minutes on a bit of self-indulgence: a good book, a second cup of coffee or glass of wine, an evening without Facebook and Netflix.
Or a long, hot bath with a touch of bath or essential oil to put some fragrance in the steam. Keep a cold drink and/or some reading material close at hand. You’ll feel like a potentate, if only for 20 minutes. Well, except that potentates don’t have to clean their own tubs.
*As those who’ve taken my Write A Blog People Will Read course know, the beginning – or “lede,” in old print newshound terms – is essential. Fail to grab the readers’ attention within 2.1 seconds and they’re off to another site. If you’re interested in stepping up your writing game, the link above gets you a 25 percent discount.
Related reading:
Oh Donna, that bath sounds heavenly! In our Little Hippie House, we have one of those teeny tubs in which an adult may submerge her knees or her torso, but not both. Someday, we may have a Japanese wooden soaking tub on the porch, but in the meantime, long, hot showers will have to suffice.
Your post is a timely one, though. because I did just book my first pedicure in about a year. I’m looking forward to that hour next Thursday after work,,, I plan to take a book, and leave my phone in my purse!
Enjoy! Especially the phone-free part.
Wonderful! I got, not one but two, gift certificates for a massage LAST YEAR! What am i waiting for?
Thanks for the reminder to take care of ourselves!
Use ’em or lose ’em! Seriously: Check to see if they have expiration dates. And enjoy.
I was just thinking yesterday, how utterly exhausted I have been. I am not one to splurge on a spa trip or massage, but in fact, it did cross my mind how nice it would be. I even went so far as thinking that maybe I should put in the request for my holiday gift from the hubby. Well, I tend to prefer practical gifts so I quickly ushered that thought away. However, that bath that you spoke of sure would fit the bill! Plus, I do not have to wait, except for my coffee pot to finish. How sweet its going to be. Thanks for the idea.
You can put cucumber slices on your eyelids if you like. Then it will feel like a spa, only cheaper.
“The Temporary Potentate” — sounds like a novel or a mid-century Audrey Hepburn movie with lots of jewels and gowns and mistaken identities but it all works out in the end. Sigh . . .
You had me at Icy Diet Coke !!
Try it sometime, but be sure that it’s been in the fridge for a day and then in the freezer for at least 15 minutes.
I too just had my first luxurious bath in ages! I was sick and it’s finals week. I tried something my stress management teacher recommended, I added epsom salts, sea salt, a pinch of baking soda, and essential oils. The electrolytes in the tub are supposed to be good for you. I do know that I felt like a whole new, relatively healthy, person!
That sounds intriguing…Glad it helped.
As for finals: You got this, even if you don’t feel that you got this. I didn’t get my degree until I was 52 and now I wonder why I doubted myself so much during the process.
I wasn’t sure about all the bath things, but I was pleasantly surprised. I do like epsom salts, as for the others, who knows? At least with the placebo effect makes you feel better. Thanks for the encouragement! My finals went fine, I’m just glad their over, and now I get to focus on getting well for a few days.
Use those days. Use them well. And congratulations on getting through the finals.
I just spent the weekend on crazy Christmas preps and the long bath sounds great. I need to go back to work tomorrow just to rest. (I had to google “FOMO”. Now I know what that means!)
I have a rule when I see myself in a mirror or reflection, I have to smile my brightest smile. Crazy and I have been caught a few times(its not the greatest way to seem sane)BUT I deserve a smile as much as anyone. I know my own struggle better than anyone else. If I’m not kind to me than who is going to be.
Oh and sometimes looking forward to a hot bath is the only thing that keeps me from going on a rampage. No LOL on that one. ;p
I happen to know just how much you deserve a smile. Glad to hear you’re providing them for yourself when no one else is doing so.