It was a strategic error on somebody’s part to put my medicine cabinet directly above the toilet. At least once each week, I knock some item or other off its shelf and watch in resigned frustration as it falls in slow motion into the toilet bowl.
On one particularly memorable morning – as memorable as anything can be before five a.m. – I went to the medicine cabinet to get a razor. All too aware of the dangers of my toilet, I was careful to hold the bar of soap very tightly in my left hand. Unfortunately, I must have held it a little too tightly, because, with a wet, squirmy motion, it shot out of my hand, ricocheted off the door to the cabinet, bounced off my forehead and fell to the toilet seat, where it spun lazily around for a second or two before sliding into the toilet bowl with a plop.
Normally, I simply fish whatever object I have just sent swimming out of the toilet with a plunger, drain it against the lip of the bowl like some sort of particularly unhygienic pasta, then scoop it into the trash can. I have gotten – and I say this with all due modesty – very, very good at this. I could compete in the Bathroom Olympics. It seemed silly to throw away a perfectly good bar of soap though. Even if I fished it out of the toilet with the plunger, I would have to wash my hands afterward anyway and my only bar of soap was floating in the toilet. So, yes – I reached in, grabbed it, then spent the next five minutes washing the bar of soap with… itself.
But that probably won’t be a problem for me this morning. This morning, my biggest problem seems to be gravity. Whoever is in charge of such things has apparently cranked the gravity knob up two or three notches, making it extremely difficult to escape from my bed. Having fallen under the spell of a Junkyard Wars marathon last night, I’m having even more trouble than usual staggering to the bathroom.
I turn on the faucet, then stand, staring into the red, haggard eyes facing me in the mirror. I plunge my hands into the still cold water, then wet my face down, making a series of “woof-woof” sounds. I paw around to my right and grab what I think is the soap, then spend a fruitless 30 or 40 seconds trying to lather up with a box of dental floss.
It’s going to be one of those days.
I lather up with the real bar of soap and have just put my razor to my cheek when I realize that I’m starting to look like a biker dude. I don’t want to look like a biker dude. I really should trim my beard. I think briefly about going to the medicine cabinet for the scissors and turn my head to look in that direction.
Unfortunately, I forget to remove the razor from my cheek and remove approximately half of my mustache in the process. I look back into the mirror at the bleary-eyed, demented biker dude there. I make a command decision; if I’m going to be bleary-eyed and demented, I should at least be bleary-eyed, demented and clean-shaven.
It takes three disposable razors to remove my goatee. It would have only taken one if I trimmed the remains of my beard with the scissors first, but given how my day has been going so far, I decide not to risk the whole dropping-the-scissors-into-the-toilet thing. My lips and chin are not used to being shaved and protest in the most dramatic way possible – by throwing themselves into the blades. I am bleeding and grumpy as I stomp my way to the shower, trying not to bleed on anything on my way.
A few weeks ago, in a fit of nostalgia, I bought a bottle of Dr. Brauner’s peppermint soap. This was very big among the granola crowd when I was in college. It’s amazing stuff. Very strong, it will clean anything – hair, teeth, laundry, your car – anything. Showering with this is a very invigorating, tingly experience.
Especially if you have several open cuts on your face.
