On Saturday morning while taking a shower, I proceeded to wash my feet. That’s just something I do. I wash my feet with soap, I mind my own business, and don’t hurt anyone. All of a sudden, I started to slip and slide. My life didn’t flash before my eyes, but I did bump against the shower wall and then almost fell through the shower curtain. I no longer have the reflexes and balance as in days past, but I was capable of not doing any damage to myself. Once I regained my composure, I realized that I could have had a mortal accident. I thought, what would happen if I were to fall to my tragic and senseless death in the shower?
The problem with living alone in a foreign country is that if you have an accidental death, no one will notice. How many days would pass before someone found my dead body, cold and wet in the shower? Who would inform my parents? I don’t think anyone I know in Spain has my parents’ phone number. Who would send the corrected presentation that I was working on before I decided to take the fateful shower? Curiously, what concerned me the most was the water. How long would the hot water run until it turned cold? Would my body look like a soaked prune to the coroner? Would I have to be dried out in the sun for days before I could be cremated or buried? Would the tub eventually leak into the ceiling of my neighbor’s apartment? Would the water bill become so suspiciously high that my landloard would call me to complain, eventually calling the police when weeks went by without my response? And what about all of that wasted water?
Grave Error 