I didn't shower last night after being out in the drizzling rain. I didn't shower after running home up the hill in an attempt to beat friends who wanted to drive me a quarter mile to my house. I didn't shower last night nor this morning. As a matter of slovenly fact, I threw on a sports bra and stayed in my t-shirt and flannel pajama pants all day long.
What horrible condition could make me shun showering, even though I clearly needed it? Simple: Fire. Not a conflagration; just a chiminea fire at the brewery down the street.
Last night we sat inside at the brewery while it spit rain and drizzled off and on, but a lovely fire was crackling in the new chinimea outside. The bar workers tended it, but no one paid it any mind. After watching it through the front window for about thirty minutes, I excused myself and went outside, enjoying the fire all to myself. Eventually, several of my compatriots joined me, and we had a beer at the mini-fire pit before heading back inside.
I enjoy the smell of a fire pit, the smokey aroma clinging to my hair and my clothes. When I arrived home after the brewery, I slipped into my flannel pajama pants, hung my fleece on the bedroom door knob, and fell asleep with the lingering smell of wood fire in my hair and in the air of my room.
All day today the wafting scent of wood fire permeates my brain. I am correcting papers, and I smell last night's fire. I am sorting dirty laundry, and I smell last night's fire. I snuggle in my fleece, and I smell last night's fire.
Finally, though, the bed has been changed and it's getting near time to start my work week. I need to get to sleep, but I have to shower. The best and worst of it all is getting my hair wet. The best part is that I can smell the smoke in my hair, and the steam from the shower makes a misty aroma of firewood as if I am standing back at the chiminea (except with clothes on ... not IN the shower). The worst part is when I have to shampoo the smell away.
Not only do I rinse away the fire pit, but I also rinse away the tail end of my weekend. Back to the grind in a few hours. Clean hair, clean sheets, clean slate. Like the smoke evaporating into thin air last night, my days off evaporate into thin air of late Sunday evening, and already I miss my flannel day of smoky laziness.
