"One's never alone with a rubber duck" - Douglas Adams

    As I stare dumbfounded at the water running across my floor I think back fondly to an hour ago when getting my nine year old into the shower seemed like a good idea. It should be a simple thing right.? I mean we all take showers every day...most of us take showers every day.
    The process begins with convincing him to take the shower. What starts as a simple request usually degenerates into a yelling of orders and stomping through the house. Once parental control is restored it is imperative that the ducky towel and it's acceptable washcloth pairing are located.
    Next comes the water preparation, and apparently my son has the skin of a burn victim since the amount of time and micro adjustments to water temperature usually involve advanced calculus and NASA instrumentation.
     Finally with the shower running and child in it we can relax...um no. The constant reminders to actually wash using shampoo and soap are absolutely necessary to avoid later arguments like "...but you never told me." and "I didn't know." As are reminders of where to wash, trust me little boys lose track of all their parts. Later in life guys don't have that problem, we never forget to wash our "parts"...usually twice.
      So I go about my business thinking the running water and the squeaking rubber duck means all is well. The sudden pitter patter of wet feet tell me different, but my investigation reveals no naked, wet children wandering about.
      Unaware of any problems I went to retrieve my child from his shower. As I approached the bathroom the horror of leaving my child unsupervised for the eternity that is 10 minutes became evident. As Noah and his ark passed by me I waved politely and climbed into the boat now docked down the hall from the bathroom and made my way to my pre-teen Poseidon.
       I followed the river to it's source and docked my boat at the bathtub. The open shower curtain still allowing a torrent of water to flow out onto the tile floor. I yelled to my child and pointed out what he had done when he left the shower for his wet walkabout, his only response was "Oh".
      Well at least when I asked him why he left the shower in the first place he had a good reason... "I don't know."

     

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