Here's my answer to the U of Chicago prompt which reads:
Essay Option 2. Dog and Cat. Coffee and Tea. Great Gatsby and Catcher in the Rye. Everyone knows there are two types of people in the world. What are they?
I need to turn this thing in today so all comments would be loved. Sorry if it is a tad long. I welcome all opinions and criticism! Will obviously return the favor. Thank you.
"The only time the world beats a path to your door is if you're in the bathroom"
-Anonymous
The significance of the bathroom has dramatically evolved over the past millenniums. Once just a simple hole in the ground, the bathroom now holds a very special place in our society. It is where girls delicately apply their makeup, hoping to impress boys, and where boys roughly shave the jungles that they call beards, hoping to impress their moms. It is the best friend of those who had a long night out while being the enemy of stay-at-home mothers who spend all day in. Sometimes in the mirror we talk quietly to ourselves and other times in the shower we belch out pop songs for the world to hear. There exists a toiletry arms race even. Not satisfied with porcelain or wood, some people opt for gold, whether it be adorned on sink handles or plastered across walls. We build monstrous caverns of his-and-her sinks, remote controlled toilets, and six person Jacuzzi baths. Though the novelty of these bathroom advancements is admirable, one question still lingers over it all: How much do people actually use their bathrooms? Thus, the world falls into two very distinct yet close categories: bathtub-ers and shower-ers.
As one would assume, bathtub-ers are people who take baths. However, the true essence of a bathtub-er doesn't come from what they do but how they do it. Bathtub-ers take indulgence in cleaning themselves. They happily wait the fifteen to twenty minutes for the water to heat and for the tub to fill, lighting their lavender scented candles and setting their bottles of colorful bath salts and oils next to the tub the whole time. Bathtub-ers willingly sacrifice not just a willingness to pay for the extra water utility bill but time and patience as well; "Ahhhh. This is what I'm talking about," they'll say as they melt into the water. A bath only ends once a bathtub-er has reached full satisfaction. Consequently, baths can last from thirty minutes to an extreme three hours. This sort of bathtub behavior extends across all facets of bathroom life for bathtub-ers. Taking a #2 isn't a "task" but instead a relaxing break, spent either reading or just thinking. Bathtub-er Hall of Fame inductee Alicia Keys once said, "If I want to be alone, some place I can write, I can read, I can pray, I can cry, I can do whatever I want-I go to the bathroom." Bathtub-ers view their bathrooms as sanctuaries.
What bathtub-ers really are though are people living in the now. They are thorough thinkers, taking their time to methodically go through every situation to take the most out of it that they can. They prefer the immediate pleasure and accept every opportunity that offers it. They are the ones who stop and smell the bath water roses on this journey that we call life. If you're lucky, you might catch one of them. They like to eat at restaurants on a weekday besides Friday. Bathtub-ers tend to be the looking a bit happier more than most.
Shower-ers represent the antithesis of bathtub-ers. They don't believe in wasting so much time on bathing themselves and so, opt for the much quicker and much more efficient overhead showers. Instead of wallowing in the therapeutic scents of cocoa or passionfruit, shower-ers rush through their routine satisfied with the smell of "Original." They hastily apply body wash, concerned not with exfoliation or smoothness but only with whether they reached every square inch of their body. "Lather and rinse," they tell themselves as they force shampoo into their hair, "never repeat." On a good day, a shower-er gets in and out of the bathroom in less than six minutes and on a bad day, ten minutes. Unsurprisingly, shower-ers carry this mentality throughout the entire bathroom. They refuse to pull out a magazine when sitting on the toilet bowl and will even avoid using soap when "washing" their hands. Shower-ers don't even brush their teeth in the bathroom! Electric toothbrush in mouth, they spend the recommended two minutes typing up emails. To shower-ers, the bathroom represents an inconvenience, a distraction from the other things that need to get done.
On the much larger level, shower-ers are those who always keep an eye on the future. Rather than focusing on the right now like bathtub-ers do, shower-ers constantly prepare for the "coming up." They're worried about their imminent office presentations or school essays so to make time to work on those things, shower-ers minimize time spent on what they consider the trivial. They rarely cook their own meals or make trips to the gym. Shower-ers center their attention on what they believe are the important things in their life, the things that will give them happiness later. Most of the time, they complete their tasks. In a shower-er's version of "the journey," one is supposed to sprint past the rose bushes and dandelion fields to rest under the shade of the big trees ahead.
So where am I, a shower-er or a bathtub-er? Though the bathtub lifestyle holds obvious appeal, I'm well aware of its downfalls. By becoming too grounded in the present, I might lose sight of the future and what I will need to tackle it. I could stay up late until 3AM with my friends the night before school starts, savoring the last moments of summer, but I would end up with a grumpy start to the new school year. Living life as bathtub-er requires me to constantly give up a little part of myself in my pursuit of immediate happiness. Maybe that's why I always end up wrinkly after a bath. However, life as just a shower-er won't work for me. Sure, I'll get done what I'm supposed to get done. The problem though is that I have no guarantee of the future happiness I am supposing exists. The contentment that a shower-er ever has is the assumption that he will get rewarded for all of his hard work. What if that reward never comes though?
I know that I want to have a successful future, traveling the world to international cities like Madrid or Tokyo, but I don't want to achieve that and then look back at my younger years to see only sadness and frustration. To accomplish this balance, I live my life between the realms of shower-er and bathtub-er. I might convert into a fervent shower-er during finals week and then return to the bathtub-er mindset in the summer months. I'm a showtub-er of sorts. People say that you would learn a lot about somebody if their living rooms walls could talk. I'd rather ask their bathroom walls.
