Unless you are moving out of absolute necessity, the whole point of travel and movement is to expose your senses to different stimuli. Encounters that diverge from one’s standard baseline and, as such, helps our figurative brain to maintain the consistency of silly putty as it ages. All of the people who are ready to draw a protective border between “their way of living” and the real or perceived means of others? That’s not something I wish to become.

But exclusivity at the same time is something that we all still crave. There’s a balance to be struck, I am sure, but I also recognize that finding such a sweet spot can take a lot of trial and error. Sometimes, we do a good job of moderating our dips into frivolousness in the name of well-being. Other times, we find ourselves embarking upon activities that are downright silly. In any culture.

And here is where I tell you about the Emotional Shower.  

Maybe there’s a better translation, but the Italians call it “una doccia emozionale”. My Italian is far from great—and while the term is fairly simple—to me, this is the English term that I have the most fun in using. “I’m going to go and take an emotional shower now.”  See it’s just like a normal shower, but it has one quirk: inside the bathroom somewhere (or in the shower itself), there’s a “power” button. You turn it on along with the water and off you go. It’s like a county fair disco under goccie.

I know what some of you are now thinking—and I will remind you that this is a family blog. 

This isn’t my first encounter with fancy showers. My apartment in Dakar inexplicably had this space capsule-looking shower with a remote control and 10 different buttons. It was like a car wash. It also had a radio inside, and after my long runs I would step inside, rinse off the Harmattan sand from my face and listen to West Africa Democracy Radio. For sure that was decadent, but I loved every moment.

But back to the emotional shower. This particular product is something that I have come across in several Italian hotels and bed & breakfasts. It’s an exclusive amenity that is boasted about on websites, something that is apparently sought after. It’s a thing.  After experiencing about three of these things now, I will tell you that I don’t really get the appeal. I remain open to stepping into new experiences, but to me, this thing is about as unsatisfying as a Lite-Brite. 

Furthermore, I don’t understand how this bathroom production line has taken off in this country. Italia. A land with a perpetual stranglehold on first place in the category of emotions. These people have never needed the jolt of electric light in order to get in touch with their feelings. Anyone who has ever even seen a snapshot of Italy knows that its inherent ability to convey light across the land unmatched. 

Recently I was driving solo along the coastline, taking in the mezzogiorno as the sun painted both the sea and snow-tipped mountains of Calabria. Nobody drives in a straight line in this country, and I suspect one (small) reason for this is that they’re all busy looking at the world around them. Driving along the water will never be as quick as your navigation tells you—because invariably you or the people around you will be stopping and going on account of the terrain. Indeed, during my seaside drive, at every major stretch of beach or sidewalk, I had to break for the handfuls of humans wandering across the main streets so they could gain a closer look at colors. 

Like my friends living in the south of France, the Med here is constantly painted all the shades of blue that we retroactively place on our photos depicting lesser blues. Experienced in real time, these colors serve to slow you down. Make you smile. Pause your brain. A shift takes place, if only for a moment or two. The application of sea with sun is enough to invoke emotion for anyone. Gratis.   

And if such panoramas aren’t your thing, well Italy has that emotional shower waiting back at the hotel.

One of the latest B&Bs I booked into placed me in a room with what I will call an Emotional Tub. The beast took up half of the room and was the color of cherry JELL-O. And for this dessert, there was no school cafeteria-style whipped cream. Instead it was a wall mounted TV that you could attempt to watch over the whirl of the jets. I ignored the emotional shower located just next to the tub and hopped in after a long run. I found an Italian show about a guy taking a glitzy bath. We were both feeling our emotional heaven. 

I’m keen to ask around and see if I can find some Italians (or otherwise) who really believe in the emotional shower. I mostly suspect that it will become one of those things that pass into a relative oblivion—like the waterbed.  And some day in the future it will be replaced by something new and exciting—like a Craftmatic II Adjustable Bed. Travel, for reasons like these, is always worth doing. And continuing to do. You simply never know what you are going to encounter when you head out on the road. If nothing else, it’s always a feast for the senses.