Has it been a tiring day and you need to relax?
Or
Do you have a busy day ahead of you and you want to be ready for it in the best possible way?

The best thing to do in either of these situations is take a nice, hot bath or shower. Once inside the confines of the sanctuary that is your bathroom, what better way to relax further than to hum or sing loudly your favourite song? It does not matter if you don’t know the lyrics – you can simply make up your own. They will sound just as good, if not better.

Bathroom singing is an art that, like all ancient arts, is fast dying. The reasons for its extinction are not hard to find. The modern life and its ways are fast killing it.

Firstly, the time we spend in the bathroom has reduced greatly. Gone are the times when one had nothing better to do but spend a good half hour in there, just enjoying the bath. Now the world outside is calling, and everyone wants to spend as little time inside as possible. TV, Internet, cell phones are the new distractions, not to mention work.

Secondly, taking a bath has become so complicated. A different soap to wash your face, a different for the rest of your body; arms need to look good as well, so a moisturizing soap is a necessity for them.  Then you need a shampoo for the hair, and conditioner, and the list could go on. What happened to the good old times of: “One soap to wash them all, one soap to clean them”. One has to pay so much attention to all this stuff inside the bathroom that singing does not even enter the calculations.

Thirdly, as cities have grown, there has come about a concept of living in apartments, which has also led a decline in the practice of this great art. Now, when you sing in your bathroom, all the neighbours are listening to your performance. Some might come complaining and sometimes you, yourself, might just shy out of singing. Bathroom singing is strictly for “our ears only”, and if we wanted people to hear our singing, would we not be singing on stage?

Lastly, the sudden increase in reality shows like American Idol, Indian Idol, Australian Idol, and the clones have taken our traditional bathroom singer to the television. Anyone who thought he was any good went out to audition and was told that he or she had potential and they should try next time. Now they think that bathroom singing will ruin it for them and they don’t do it anymore.

Well, be it as it may be, I am not going to let this art die, and as long as I am alive and taking a bath, you can pass by my bathroom window and hear me sing. Don’t worry if you don’t know the song. More likely than not, it is something that I just made up.

(Image courtesy: salinqpusa from sxc.hu)

(The post is an adapted version of a post that was originally posted on the author’s blog)