Have you ever showered in the dark before? I don’t mean showered in the near-dark with your girlfriend/boyfriend with the lights off and a few candles lit by the sink. We’ve all done that. I mean close the door, turn off the lights, in the dark.

I just did, for no apparent reason, and it’s an entirely surreal experience.

First of all, it’s (surprise!) dark. Not the same dark as when you take a shower with your eyes closed, trying to catch a few more minutes of restful half-slumber before your day really begins and you have to merge into the ever-increasing speed of daily life. In those cases, you know it’s supposed to be dark, you have your eyes closed. In this other way, though, you have your eyes open, and you see nothing, absolutely nothing. You can’t, as the saying goes, see the hand in front of your face.

Weird.

That initial time is a little bit freaky, and at the same time, a lot bit soothing. You’re in your own (dimly-lit) world, cocooned from everything outside of the shower stall. It’s calm.

Gradually, you begin to get the impression of something, a very faint glow. In time you’ll realize that it’s the shower curtain dispersing what little light there is coming in from under the door. At about this same time you’ll recognize the shape of your hand passing between this glow and your face. Turn around, though, and it’s still l inky blackness, now a bit more foreboding for being on the edge of this new existence.

More minutes pass and the magic gradually dissolves away. Now you’re just taking a shower at twilight, and all is more or less normal. This is when you start talking to yourself as if an imagined person walked into the bathroom at just that moment. “Umm, Dave? Are you in here? What the hell are you doing?” you’ll say, and laugh to yourself.

Showers in the dark: recommended.