What is it with roaming eyes in the shower these days? Almost weekly I have to tut or reproach someone for peering into my shower cubicle. It's not that I'm shy, far from it; it's the principle. If the cowboy door is closed and the shower is running, don't look in - simple. So what if oftentimes I enjoy languishing in the shower, head bowed, arms crossed, rocking from side to side like the proverbial Romanian orphan? I like it. To the casual intruder, the image might resemble a boy who suddenly grew boobs and is checking out what they actually do. But that’s the body-curious onlooker’s problem. Mind you, that sight is nothing if you’ve ever attended a communal shower. Extreme pub(l)ic hygiene does need to get a room.
Then there’s bog chancers. This mostly affects women. You go into the toilet, you close the cubicle door, then you find the lock doesn't work. What the hell, you hold it firmly shut, clearly shut. There are 20 other available cubicles, with doors ajar, evidently empty, yet you can *guarantee* some chief will try your door, causing head injury or momentary confusion over who is actually in the wrong. At this point I usually issue an apology, then hastily, audibly retract it: “Actually, it wasn’t my fault, it was yours”. (I perform this Apology Retraction to strangers a great deal, especially when there’s mutual fault, and the other person fails to apologise also).
Anyway, showers… Today a woman actually opened the door to my shower, stepped in, and only then deigned to introduce her purpose: “Oh, I was wondering if I’d left my key in here”. By now she’s IN my f*cking cubicle. I don’t care if you’ve left your aristocratic Grandmother’s 5 carat engagement ring in my cubicle, have some dignity. I was agog, aghast, didn’t know what to say. It’s not that I’m shy, far from it; it’s the principle. Totally unacceptable! AND she rested her hands on my towel. I struggled to find the right words. “You could have knocked” didn’t seem reasonable for a cowboy door shower cubicle. She definitely wasn’t taking a day trip to the Isle of Lesbos either, it was just sheer rudeness - a willful and self-important disregard of *my* privacy. I’ll wager it rarely happens in quite the same way in the men’s showers, as what straight man wants to chance upon another chap carefully lathering his bell end?