Bath Boy - W. Bruce Cameron

(Editor’s Note: The following column was originally published in 2008.)

There comes a time in every teenage boy’s life when the best thing he can do for the other members of his family is take a bath. His glands are producing testosterone, which is a hormone that causes deepening voices, body odors and “Jackass” movies.

When boys first start experiencing testosterone, they have no idea how to control the reckless impulses that will seize their brains. Later, once they’ve matured, they will discover that they can master these impulses — they’ll just choose not to do so.

But initially it is a bit bewildering to realize that while last year you threw dirt clods at the girl down the street, this year you’re trying to get her attention by riding your bicycle over a huge jump you built that seems intended to cause permanent damage to the part of your body producing the testosterone that’s causing this behavior in the first place. Just when you’re suddenly willing to accidentally be forced to sit next to her on the school bus, she and her friends report that you “stink” and that you have “B.O.,” making these somehow sound like bad things.

Add to it the fact that everyone in the family has voted that you should take a bath and that it is time your clothes be washed, dried and buried in the backyard, and it will suddenly become obvious that the time has come to pay more attention to personal hygiene. At least, it will become apparent to everyone but the teenage boy, who doesn’t see what the issue is, since the dog still likes him.

When I, at age 13 or so, finally relented and took a shower and put on the new clothes my mother had bought for me, I was actually afraid I would be shunned by the boys at school.

“Cameron, you smell like a girl, why don’t you go play with the girls, Cameron, you girl-smeller,” they’d jeer.

“Class,” the teacher would say, “I want everyone to notice that Bruce no longer has things living in his hair.”

“Bruce,” the girls would say, “come sit with us and chew gum and put on makeup and say horrible things about the girl who was our best friend last week and will be our best friend next week but this week we all hate for some reason.”

“I can’t go to school today, Mom,” I told my mother.

“Why, are you sick?”

No, I wasn’t sick, it was worse than that — I was clean.

I was so self-conscious at the bus stop, I deliberately stood downwind from everyone so they wouldn’t know I’d brushed my teeth.

My new shirt, painfully unstained, made me feel horribly immaculate. I slouched aboard the bus and found a seat by myself — who would want to sit by me, with my blue jeans so disgustingly free of holes?

As the bus doors slammed shut, one last passenger slipped aboard — Susie, the girl I’d tossed dirt clods at the year before and who had been unimpressed with my bike jump even though I had a really cool crash where I fell on my head. Swaying as the bus lurched forward, she was dumped onto the seat next to me. I turned away, my misery complete — why today, of all days?

“New outfit?” Susie asked me.

I choked back my humiliation, nodding curtly. Boys don’t wear outfits, for heaven’s sake. “Hey, Cameron, why don’t you put on your new outfit?” The only thing I could think of that might save me is if alien spaceships would fire death rays at the school bus before it arrived at its destination. I scanned the skies, but they, like my ridiculous outfit, were pristine. Kids in science-fiction movies were always getting fried by death rays — they were so lucky.

Susie bent over her notebook to write something, while I continued to stare out the window for UFOs or meteors. When, to my disgust, the bus pulled up in front of the school safely and without flames, Susie handed me a note, which I unfolded and read as we all swarmed to class.

“You look nice today,” the note said.

After that, I didn’t feel so bad.

To write Bruce Cameron, visit his Website at http://www.wbrucecameron.com. To find out more about Bruce Cameron and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate web page at http://www.creators.com.

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