(Btw, can we talk about how I literally have 6 different photos of me posing with the wood because I couldn’t decide which look I liked best. Aye, aye, aye.)
I mean, there wasn’t really a “BathroomGate.” That’s kind of a ridiculous title. But because I value my precious, precious sleep oh so very much, it sort of felt like it!
In case you missed it, there was a leak below me. So the maintenance people came up and totally tore apart my bathroom – making holes in walls, taking off faucets, all that jazz over a multi-day period.
Once they were finally done, they left me a mess! (A mess, I tell ya!) I wish I would’ve taken pictures of the state it was in so you could see. But there was white dust everywhere (everywhere!). There were dirty paper towels on the ground.
(Also, my shower faucet is now on upside-down… but I can live with that…)
At first I was kind of ignoring it, pretending like if I just never cleaned up after them my bathroom would magically clean itself. Of course, that’s not how life works.
This weekend, I finally bit the bullet and went to work on it.
And I have to say, it was really fun. Why? Because it wasn’t just cleaning a bathroom. It was cleaning a bathroom while belting out all my favorite showtunes.
Is there anything I like more in this world than putting on my musical theater eyes and singing to my heart’s content? I’m gonna have to go with no. I can’t think of a single thing I like better.
It was fun to clean the bathroom in different characters. When Cathy did it, she was trying to rid her apartment of the memories of Jaime. When Elphaba did it, she was packing to get out of there. When Effie did it – by golly, the shampoo bottles, the Origins skincare products, and even the plunger – they were all gonna looooooooooooove her.
(But my favorite was when Rose did it – not because there’s any kind of special scenario as to why she’d be cleaning a bathroom, but because I love the songs from Gypsy so much it hurts. And 30 years from now, I will play her somewhere. I don’t care if it’s in a 20-seat venue. I will be singing that “some people ain’t me!”)
(But fyi casting directors of the internet, I’m ready to play Kate Monster, Olive Ostrovsky, or Cathy (aka (full-out sings): Mrs. Jaime Wellerstein) right this moment.)
Aaaaaannnnyyyway, I digress. Everyone except people who care way too much about musical theater has totally checked out by now.
I’m pretty sure all I was trying to say is that when something doesn’t seem like it’s going to be all that fun, it actually can surprise me when I decide to just make it fun. At first, cleaning up someone else’s mess in my bathroom seemed like the last thing I wanted to do. But I was having so much fun on my magic carpet rides, and in all the other fun places in my imagination, that it ended up feeling like there was nowhere else I’d rather be than cleaning my bathroom.
Once it was nice and clean, I felt empowered. Mmmm, clean, organized spaces. Feels so good! (And leaves you much more space for tap dancing when “I Wanna Be A Producer” comes on.)