Less is Less

For five of our seven years in Alaska, Matt and I lived in a dry cabin. This means we did not have running water. This means we had to haul our own from town and learn to really conserve what we used. This also means we used an outhouse and had no shower. Thank goodness, therefore, for the local video store (I’m revealing my shocking true age in admitting that this was still the era of brick-and-mortar DVD rental joints – they may have even still carried some VHS tapes)! Yes, you could pay $3 and take a nice, hot, 6-minute shower at the video store in Two Rivers, AK, which was open 3-9pm most days. The same was true of the laundromat, where you had the advantage of being able to run a load while you got your own gunk off so you could slip your clean body into clean clothes at the end, but it was pricier, busier, and we only did laundry every 2 weeks. The inconvenience pushed showers from an unexamined daily routine to a considered choice.

Takeaway? We realized we really didn’t need to shower that often. Even with the dirt of the dog yard (we had a small dog team) and mushing, and hiking, and skiing, we found that, after the sweat dried, we didn’t always need to hop in the shower immediately. About twice a week was plenty. My skin and hair thanked me. It turns out your skin and hair produce oils for a reason, and we do ourselves damage by routinely stripping them off. If my hair gets weird on days 2, 3, or 4 between showers, I toss it under a cute headscarf or throw it back in a hairband. Now that I’m using shampoo bars instead of bottled shampoo, I’m finding that my hair stays nicer longer between showers, too.

Recent evidence also points to the benefits of leaving your microbiome intact. We are we’s, with something like a 57% nonhuman cellular makeup. We are also our bacteria and viruses and fungi, and most of them do important work in the community that is our macroorganism. We kill them off at our peril.

When we moved to Montana, I experienced the shock of having an actual bathroom with an actual toilet and an actual shower right inside our house! It felt like a luxury. Years later, it still does. I am actually grateful every time I step into that shower, and, rather than an unquestioned right, it feels like a rare privilege. This is a great head space to be in in an era when water is quickly becoming the planet’s most precious resource, and one we need to be conscientious in conserving.

Clearly, everyone’s physiology is different, and some will have different needs, but hygiene habits are cultural practices and therefore well worth revisiting and revising as we come into new information. Less, it turns out, is less, and that is a good thing: in spending less time scouring, so we can spend more time with each other; in spending less money on our water bill and toiletries; and in taking less of a toll on our health, both our own and that of the ecological community at large.