It’s a rain day, and while I’m no wuss about most weather conditions I hate being in the rain. Today’s rain didn’t bother me so much, since there is not much wind. But typically I feel like I’m under some kind of duress, like I’m being punished, when getting out on rainy days.
I went out anyway, an ever-determined flâneur, just to quell some cabin fever. Temperatures have plunged of late. Between that and the gloomy overcast and general seasonal adjustment behavior I’ve been sleeping really well, but maybe too long.
I had posted earlier that voter turnout for early voting was phenomenal. Now I question if that’s really true, or if the Covid precautions of limiting the number of voters allowed in the space slowed the process down and thus caused the slow-moving lines.
I did not stay in the voting room for any longer than it took to drop my absentee ballot into the box but the room seemed rather sparsely populated. Whatever the case I was happy to skip the line.
Today I await delivery of a shower caddie. Such a mundane object probably would inspire little excitement to most but I’m looking forward to further enhancing what has become an important part of my life: My morning shower thoughts. I’ve recorded umpteen hours of this stuff since 2017, and while I play it back infrequently I’m almost always positively surprised when I do, happy to have documented certain thoughts and experiences.
I also just think it sounds cool, the acoustics of the shower and, if I may say so myself, the sound of my voice. I use a 3D binaural mic that sometimes picks up sounds of everything, including sirens wailing outside, planes overhead, and the noises made when upstairs neighbors flush the toilet.
To be sure, much of what comes out of my mouth in these rambles is pitiful drivel. I also have a tendency to drift away from a thought or a subject before fully wrapping it up. But that’s part of the project. I would think to outside listeners there are a lot of times when it is not obvious what the hell I’m talking about.
The goal is to set up a dedicated radio stream with this content carefully edited to chop out names of real people. It’s as close as I’ve ever come to meditating, and is a product of what I think is the best change I ever made to my diurnal routines: I now sit in the shower. To make this viable I procured of an extra long shower hose that reaches to the floor.
A few times since I started sitting I’ve tried standing again and it just feels awkward.
Originally I had misgivings about how potential listeners might regard the concept of a naked guy sitting in a shower, talking to himself. But I’m over those scruples, at least for now, or until somebody pronounces it creepy. I’m not doing video, after all, though a documentary film maker was interested enough in this little ritual to record me doing it. She did it artistically, putting up multiple opaque shower curtains and giving me all assurances that nobody would “see” anything but the foggy, nebulous profile of my head and shoulders.
That said, I did float the suggestion that I emerge from the shower after I’m done, full frontal, to get me drying off. But the film maker wanted none of that.
I don’t usually talk while showering, or while the water is running. So for any extra time I spend in the shower I’m not wasting or using more water than I would otherwise.
Originally I called this radio stream, which isn’t live yet, “Shower Talk”, but thought it a pedestrian, boring title. Now I’m on “Shower Thoughts”, which I’m also not entirely satisfied with, but it gives the whole premise something that listeners could relate to. “Tub Talk” was considered and quickly dismissed.
Most of the recordings are from the beginning of my day but once in a while I take a middle-of-the-night shower and make depressing clips like the one in this story. Enjoy.
