I am one of those sad slops who lusts afters small houses. I still fantasize about “Das Rotorhaus” I gave a speech on for my Mandarin class in ninth grade:
I mean, c’mon—it rotates! Anyhow, this got me thinking: can I kill two birds with one comfy stone? Dream up an invention that both moves me closer to my small-home fetish and would just be all-around awesome?
Of course I can. Introducing the showerbed!
(Performing a Google image search for this phrase was… an interesting quest.)
Baths are nice, but I was never much one for them. As sort of mini-sensory-deprivation experiences, they’re kinda neat (or maybe they’re more about subtlety of experience—gentle sloshing of water in tub, and whatnot). I tend to crave more sensory overwhelm than anything, though. The feel of water cascading over me, the churning white noise of it: the shower is my element. Most of the poems I write begin in or include at some point a trip to an overlong shower. I am fond of seating in showers, and yeah, I have been known to lie down in the shower before.
So I thought: how can I turn this water-waste up ten notches?! Enter the showerbed. What started as my idea for a shower you could just lie comfortably down in was kicked up several notches by Mark’s post supercharging the La-Z-Boy. I now want to achieve my smaller-home dream by making my bed that plush surface on which I also shower!
None of these images really grasp the thrust of the point, though. Up until now, “shower beds” have been confined to the realm of spas and for the hygienic use of people with disabilities. (Both great things, to be sure!) But my showerbed will be more: full-service foam luxury reclining pillowed comfort, with the ability to be plunged into steaming showery soaking wet goodness at a moment’s notice.
“How can a bed made of comfortable foam or foam-like material possibly be soaked in water and still function at all well, let alone ever become dry again while avoiding transforming into a mildewy hell??” you ask? Fuck if I know! The Teslas of our time will decide this. Genius grants will be established and doled out to anyone putting forth a viable theory.
It is high time we stop living in this hellscape where I have to crawl naked from the bed to the bath and beyond. The showerbed will be the crux of the cornerstone small house of our future collective dreams.
(And stay tuned for version 2.0, which will have a waterproof Nintendo Switch built into the nozzle!)