Bathroom Bigfoot

I love my sister. She’s a cool girl. And having her around was nice over the summer. But I’d probably like her even more if she was bald. And she had her own bathroom.

When I head to the bathroom, I’m assaulted by a sasquatch of congealed face powder and shed hair, swallowing me up at the ankles. My feet don’t even know when they’ve left carpet and onto the ancient linoleum. Sometimes it gets so thick that it beckons me from the cracked floor to jump into it like a pile of leaves.

If I take a shower it’s there, mocking me and stretching itself over the drain, forcing me into a race against the clock or risk certain overflow. So there I slosh, calf-deep in murky water, scrubbing myself with a pink washcloth with a kitty cat on it. And all I can think about is the impending tsunami and trying not to accidentally crack my head against the carry-all that hangs from the showerhead bearing various lotions and creams. And sometimes... a luffa.

One time I picked it up, the tangled mass of dead skin cells that had captured our floor. "The Sasquatch." I even considered using a rake, but the amount of effort that would have required tricked me into gathering it with my bare hands. I almost lost an arm.

I went to wash my hands after the ordeal and there was Winnie the Pooh staring me in the face, his head perched on the soap dispenser. He grinned at me as I slammed my fist on his plastic skull and flowery scented soap poured onto my ruddy mitts. It’s only then that I realized that the hair had migrated and infiltrated my sink, leaving me helpless with soapy hands, Winnie my only ally against it.

The hair heap shot up and grabbed me around the wrists, restricting circulation as it pulled me closer. Winnie jumped into action, bobbing his head furiously to provide enough lubricant for my hands to slip free. I wrestled my arms loose and dashed for the door just as I heard Winnie cry out, “Go! Forget about me! Save yourself!”
I summersaulted into the hallway and yanked the door closed, straining to keep the knob from turning. Inside I could hear the death struggle and the muffled cries from Winnie. And then... suddenly... all was silent.

The summer is over now and my sister has moved back to college. Winnie was since replaced by an ordinary hand soap dispenser. But sometimes I still have nightmares about that fateful day. I can still hear the muffled screams of poor Pooh.


I know, I probably sound bitter, but that’s what happens after 6 months of bathing with Bigfoot.