I was going to sit here and “think awhile” about which object I should write a thank you to, but if anyone in my household got wind of the fact that I was writing a thank you note to ANY non-human enitity BESIDES the bathtub, I would be called out as dishonest or trying to game the prompt and make it a vehicle for me sounding cooler and more interesting than I am. I am not cool. I am not interesting.
Dear Bathtub,
Here are two facts: people need to be clean, and people are comforted by habits.
I don’t recall when I became fanatical about baths. I took them as a child, sure. I appreciated them from time to time as a teen and a young grownup. But they didn’t MATTER to me yet–the taking of baths wasn’t anything more than a means to an end. I’m sorry, Bathtub. I was foolish.
At some point, though, everything changed. My retreat to the confines of your white walls and hot water became a timeout from everything–a 30-45 (or 60…or 75….) minute block that, if I could JUST reach it and JUST MANAGE to flip on the metaphorical timer/turn the faucet, that I would be untouchable until the bath’s conclusion. Because baths do have conclusions, and beginnings, and middles. An arc. A bath is a story.
And maybe if I said that to someone they would be like, psshhh, yeah! A terrible story! Starts out all warm and bubbly and comfortable, but by the end, the water is cold and the bubbles are gone and you’re this chilled mass of damp flesh. Great story.
But, Bathtub, I don’t hold that against you. I don’t lament that my participation in a bath means navigating the line between comfort and time to go, because that’s a clarity that most of life is completely without.
When I’m cold in the bath, I get out.
Thanks for being the best,
Jackie
Today’s prompt: In a surprise twist on the normal gratitude conversation, we want you to write a thank you note to a THING–coffee, perhaps, or trashy tv, your couch, a snow shovel, whatever.
Jackie Lutzke 