How are the bathtubs?

“Ohh, it would be so nice to just soak in a hot bath right now.”

Response: “The tub is dirty, you’d have to clean it first.”

“I said I wanted to take a bath and relax, not clean the bathroom!”

This was last December, when we were planning on moving to a new home. Later that night, I went in to make a bath for the baby. My husband was right. It was gross. I wouldn’t let anything but my feet come in contact with it, and I’d scrub them vigorously, why should I make my child be mostly submerged? I immediately started scrubbing furiously, pushing back tears.

Within seconds I was bawling over the edge of the bathtub because I was afraid that no matter where I lived I'd always be disgusted by my bathtub. I felt like I would never be satisfied with my life because I would always want something more or something different than what I have today, the grass would always be greener on the other side of the fence, and my bathtub would always have old plumbing and be covered in someone else's (and my own) grime. So then it transformed into this awful depressed feeling that we were making a terrible mistake moving to a new place because no matter what I did or where I lived I would never be satisfied with my life because I would always have an ugly, dirty bathtub.

Soon afterward, when I had leveled, I realized that I had been a little emotional about dirt and had let that concern escalate, and that life really is good right now. We were making the right decision, and I could handle my bathtub wherever I live. I had confided in my visiting teacher later that week about my bathtub woes, and a month or so later after we had made the move, she very dutifully asked me, “How are the bathtubs?”

They’re great!