Shower Talk

I've mentioned to a number of friends now, that in my Honduran life, no shower goes to waste. In practically every shower, something other than myself gets cleaned as well. Every three of 4 days, I put Dulcinea in her first home to sit while I clean her tank, in the shower. Periodically my mop or a pair of shoes will come in with me for a washing.

Most commonly, it's my clothes. My original reasoning for washing my clothes came from the irrational fear that my land family will stand around and wash me do my laundry in the pila downstairs. I know this would never happen, but whenever I think of going out there, that's what I imagine. Then, on a slightly more logical note, they don't keep the pila filled. This means I would have to fill each bucketful for rinsing, instead of just dipping a bucket in to rinse, which is how I do it in the shower anyway. I am able to scrub on my shower floor. And then, the most amazing part about washing my clothes in the shower, is that I get to use hot water.

I usually wash 4-7 articles at a time. I fill a bucket with detergent and hot water to sit. Whenever it strikes my fancy, I go in for a shower. I do my personal washing in the between times, when a bucket is filling for a rinse. It certainly makes my showers longer, but I secretly (or not so secretly) enjoy showering. As I finish rinsing each article, I hang it on the cloth rack on the inside of the door, and when all is done, I get hangers for all the clothes, hang them up, and put them on the porch. Except for my underwear, which gets hung up around the house on the tops of curtain rods. My windows seem to sport a kind of underwear garden after big loads.

Since I never use the pila, but wet/clean clothes appear on my porch from time to time, I wonder if my landlords have figured out my secret. Or if they think I wash my clothes with magic.

On the days that I don't bring something in to wash with me, I usually notice that the shower could use a good scrubbing, and take advantage of the soap and water around me to take care of that. My shower always has a bucket, for soaking, and an old toothbrush, for scrubbing, and that about covers my extra-shower time needs.

In the theme of showers, my next 6-week-focus, in another 5 weeks, will be shower stretching. Since I don't run much anymore, and more than one doctor in my life has told me I need to stretch daily, I figure the shower is as good as any time. It's warm, it's daily, and, again, it will prolong what I already enjoy. Plus, it will help warm up the muscles. I really only stretch when my tendons get so tight it hurts to do daily things. That's not a particularly good sign, and I'm too young for that sort of thing. So this will help me out in the long run too.