A Hot Bath

"There must be quite a few things a hot bath won't cure,

but I don't know many of them."

-- Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

Wood mannequin soaking in a hot bath 4-24-14

"Existentialism means that no one else can take a bath for you."

-- Delmore Schwartz

"Calgon, take me away!"

-- '70s Calgon commercial

My mother used to lock herself in the bathroom and tell us kids not to bother her because she was going to take a "hot soaky".

A "hot soaky" was a long bath with a thick paperback. It was how she escaped the stress and exasperation of four demanding stair-step daughters nipping at her heels.

My mother isn't the light-candles-sip-champagne-lose-yourself-in-luxury-Calgon-bubble bath type. For her, plain hot water, a pack of Winstons and a cup of instant Maxwell House did the trick. (Although the coffee cup could very well have held a Beam and 7 -- with my mom it was entirely possible).

She almost always fell asleep (which reinforces my theory that it wasn't coffee in the cup), and didn't get out until the water had grown stone cold. Rusty-colored burns lined one edge of our tub from forgotten cigarette butts, and all of her paperbacks were swollen to twice their thickness from being dropped in the water.

I don't take hot baths to escape. I take them simply because they feel good.

I like my baths almost intolerably hot with Epsom salt and lavender oil.

Sometimes I read (not paperbacks, but my Kindle, Kindleezza, safely sealed into her ZipLock scuba suit.)

I don't light candles (or cigarettes).

I don't bring beverages.

I just sit and soak.

I took one yesterday.

It felt good.