One of my favorite hobbies is fountain bathing. It’s wonderfully freeing to go into a public fountain and lather up with Irish Spring and scrub your worries away in front of a dozen confused onlookers. If you’re lucky, some of them might join you. If you’re not, you’ll get chased away from over caffeinated security guards. Either way, it provides for an interesting afternoon.
I did it a few days ago, but everything went wrong. First, I couldn’t find any soap, so I had to grab a bottle of liquid shampoo. Then, I forgot that I was going out in the middle of the day and neglected to wear clothes. The weekend shoppers stared at me like I had grown an extra head, but I couldn’t just go home. So, I emptied the garbage bag from a nearby can to use as a makeshift tunic, clutched my bottle of shampoo and headed into the fountain… only to discover that the fountain hadn’t been cleaned in ages. Trust me, you don’t want to know what it’s like slipping on a pile of mildew and the dead skin of people’s sweating feet.
I staggered back up and started to lather up, singing and trying to pretend this was just a normal fountain bathing experience and not a complete disaster. That lasted about five minutes, until I realized I wasn’t lathering up with shampoo, but with hair dye my girlfriend had put into an empty shampoo bottle. She was currently experimenting with pink hair.
So, there I was, smearing pink dye all over myself, while wearing a dirty garbage bag and a coating of fountain slime. Everyone was staring at me more than usual, but I kept my head up and continued bathing, even though I knew I’d be a stinking pink mess at the end. But it was worth it to see hear the laughter of the crowd from the obvious joy I spread to them through my bathing prowess. A little bit of pink skin and yesterday’s lunch is a small price to pay for letting people see such fine bathing technique. So, I guess it all turned out right in the end.
Cartopia 