When I was between the age of eight and nine, there was a period of time when I was fascinated with the idea of a bubble bath. I had seen bubble baths in Western movies a few times and thought how fun it would be to play in the bubbles. I wanted to experience it myself.
At home, we had a small collection of bath bombs. Most of them were a gift from one of my elder cousins who was very into relaxation and self-care. I always loved using bath bombs, but since the supply was limited, I kept them for a special occasion.
One winter day, my two childhood best friends came over to my house for a pajama party with their younger siblings. When it was time for us to take a bath in the evening, I immediately thought of using one of the bath bombs. What could have been more fun than to try out a new bath bomb with my best friends?
As I rummaged through the drawer of bath bombs, one item caught my attention – it said “bubbles” on the backage.
“Look here!” I called out to everyone. “This bath bomb will make a bubble bath for us!”
Everybody got excited at the prospect of a bubble bath, and we immediately threw the bath bomb into the water my mother had prepared for us in the bathtub.
As we watched and waited patiently, the bath bomb slowly started to dissolve, releasing what looked like tiny bubbles. But, to our disappointment, these bubbles disappeared shortly after they appeared.
“Strange,” I said, thinking hard what was the problem.
“Maybe we have too much water?” One of my friends suggested.
“Yes, that could be it,” agreed another one. “Let’s remove some water.”
Thus, we unplugged the bathtub and released quite a bit of water, hoping that it would help the bubbles to accumulate. But the bubbles continued to disappear. We removed even more water. In the end, almost all the water was gone when my mother appeared at the door for a casual check-in. Her face froze in shock upon seeing five little children squeezed in the almost empty bathtub.
“What’s going on here?” She gasped. “Why there is no water in the bathtub?”
We all eagerly explained to her that we were trying to make a bubble bath.
“But the bubbles kept disappearing, so we thought less water would help.”
“But children,” my mother continued in her shock state. “There is no water in the bathtub! Forget about bubbles and come out of the bathtub immediately. Otherwise, you’ll catch a cold!”
As we got out of the bath and changed into our night clothes, my mother quickly called me aside.
“What was that about? It’s middle of winter and you were sitting in an empty bathtub. Do you realize how silly that is?”
“But Mom, we just wanted to try a bubble bath,” I explained to her. “It was written ‘bubbles’ on the bath bomb, but the bubbles didn’t last long.”
For the first time, my mother understood which bath bomb I was talking about and looked at me half in disbelief and half amused.
“You silly girl,” she laughed. “That bath bomb will never make a bubble bath. You need soap for a bubble bath!”
That was my first and last misadventure around a bubble bath. After that event, I became less eager about bubble baths. Too much trouble, it felt to me, and I decided to content myself with regular bath bombs instead.