up in my grill: a story about personal space

Pregnancy has made me hyper-aware of my personal space, my "bubble" if you will. Even my poor Christian has had to deal with this as I tell him to move over in the middle of the night mmm... probably every time we sleep. That being said, here is a story about the ultimate space invasion that I'm pretty sure even a non-preggie person wouldn't appreciate. Sorry in advance for talking about the gym AGAIN, as well as the extensive use of the word "naked" in this post. You've been warned.

So a little background... on Thursdays and Fridays, I have to shower and get ready at the gym. Long story short, it's just a lot easier than going home. 

And here's the story. Usually I'm the only one in the showers, which is nice because even though I wouldn't care if I had to parade my naked self around in front of a bunch of strangers, it's something I like to avoid if possible. You know. For the people. Anyways, so this morning. Just me in the showers. There were 8 others available. I was seriously in one at the very end of the row. Right as I'm about to shave my legs, I hear the stall next to me open and what do you know. Another naked lady got in the shower. LITERALLY RIGHT NEXT TO ME. 

Here are the reasons why this was a problem:

(As if I should have to explain this, but apparently I do, so....)

1. The showers are entirely plexiglass, also known as entirely see through. Again... Whatever, you can see me naked stranger, I really don't care. Pregnancy has filled me with reckless *naked* abandon obviously. BUT I DON'T WANT TO LOOK AT ANYONE ELSE'S AWKWARD NUDE BODY. EVER.

2. Does anyone else just relish in their showers? Because I do. I love hot water and I love being clean and I love shutting everything out for just a few minutes every day. Except sometimes I do really wish all that could be wrecked by someone else wanting to take a shower right next to me of course. 

OH. WAIT. 

3. She had a nice tan, except for on her derriere of course. Meaning that even in my peripheral, I was getting a blinding view of a naked bum that starkly contrasted with the rest of her skin. A naked bum that I did NOT sign up to look at for the duration of my supposedly peaceful shower. So there's that.

4. Can we again just discuss the fact that we were both naked and showering literally a foot from each other?! I mean, did she not think this through before she decided to just hop right in next to me?! Or was she just like "Nothing better than communal showers, I wish we had a public bath in the middle of the town square, but this will have to doooooo!"

Of all the awkward.

5. So since I didn't want to look at her, of course I turned my back. Then I realized I wasn't making things better because I was just mooning her. Aaaaand the awkwardness continues.

6. Then again, maybe she did deserve to be mooned a little bit.......

7. THEN we had to get out of the shower, roughly at the same time of course, and proceed to make awkward eye contact for the next 30 minutes while we simultaneously got ready. All I could think was: 

"You have a really white bum."

Of course.

You guys. Am I crazy for being so irritated that she got in the shower right next to me? 

I don't think it would have bothered me even half as much if she had even just had a bathing suit on! But no, she had to go full-on birthday suit and make it as awkward as possible for both of us. 

Lessons learned from this experience: if you are ever faced with the decision 

"Should I, or should I not, get naked and go shower right next to this person for the ensuing 10 minutes?"

THE ANSWER SHOULD ALWAYS BE NO. 

No, you just should NOT do that.