Sauna

'Nuther weird day in the life of a bad sci-fi writer.

 

THE LUXURY OF A PRIVATE SAUNA

 

It takes about two hours to heat it up. It’s just a small, 8’ x 12’ wood storage shed on the property that wasn’t being used, so I insulated it and installed a wood-burning barrel stove wrapped with rocks. If I’m patient I can get it to almost 200 degrees. Unfortunately I’m a sauna wuss, so I’m pretty happy around 160. When it was finished I made the mistake of telling a few friends about it. They’ve been dropping by every Tuesday evening (by invite) ever since. That’s fine, but they also ‘drop by’ Wednesdays, Fridays, Saturday afternoons, all day Sunday, most Mondays,… you get the picture.

To accommodate the crowd I added an outside deck for cooling periods. The deck faces out over Kachemak Bay, Alaska, and the mountains on the other side. It’s a breath-taking view of at least a couple hundred square miles of some of God’s best work. There is nothing on this planet more relaxing than getting’ good and sweaty, interdispersed* with cooling periods sitting naked on the deck watching an Alaska sunset. I can see why people stop over so often. I’d be a “sauna-crasher” too if I didn’t have one. I do, so I became the enabler.

It was a Thursday. I’m almost never home Thursdays, so no one suspected I would crank up the heat box. Although it’s always nice to have guests, especially of the gorgeous type, I seldom get to do it alone and greedy sensationalist that I am, I was very much looking forward to it.

After a warm-up of about an hour and a half it was time. The phone rang, rang again, then a third and forth time. I let the answering machine pick it up because I was never home Thursdays. No one needed to know anything different. Monica’s voice reminded me about karaoke Friday, and babbled about something else. I didn’t pick up. I felt a little guilty, wait - no I didn’t. I put three beers in my ice bucket, grabbed a load of towels out of the dryer and headed out for a nice, private meditation.

As usual, I dropped trau on the observation deck in the 50 degree Alaska evening air. There’s something wonderful about standing naked out in nature. I dug it for a minute or so, until my body wanted heat. Opening the door I threw the towels on a bench, then folded them slowly, enjoying the 100 degree temperature of the dressing room, knowing that the actual sauna room would be at least 40 degrees warmer. The last towel filled the shelf nicely, and I opened the door into the “heat chapel.”

I was already sitting on the top bench. Huh? No. I was standing in the door looking at… myself, sitting in front of me.

“Hi.” The other “I” said.

You know, it’s funny how the mind works. My first reaction was to wrinkle my eyebrow and tilt my head. Didn’t change anything. I immediately went through the possibilities in my head. Could be a coincidental look-alike thief here to kill me and steal my – what, clean towels? Could be a long lost, very rich relative from thousands of miles away who had decided to stop by and drop off a few mill? I seriously doubted it. Could be a hallucination from hitting my head in a fall – off a three-foot high deck? (I felt my head for bumps. Nothing.) Could be a dream? That’s it, I fell asleep in the living room while the sauna was heating up. I must be lying on the couch right now dreaming all this crap. I pinched myself. That hurts. The other “I” just sat there kind of giggling. Hmmm. Could be… well s**t! It couldn’t be!

“Alright,” I said, “What the f**k is going on here? Who are you? What’s the idea of, um, impersonating me?” I though about how stupid that sounded even as I asked the question.

“I thought it might be fun.” he, well I, said.

OK, I have a pretty good imagination. I’m also very comfortable living by myself sixteen miles outside a small town in Alaska. One of the things I discovered right away when I moved here is that strange things happen. This was a strange thing. I closed the wood door behind me and ignored everything. I went about laying my towel on the bench where I usually sit for my roasting sessions. Before sitting down I looked back at, um, myself, sitting on the top bench. I was still smiling at me. God that’s annoying.

“You thought what might be fun?” I asked me.

“Screwing with your head.”

“Huh?” (Amazing how eloquent I can be in a crunch.)

“I said I thought it would be fun to mess with you.” he, I, told me again, still wearing that s**t-eatin’ grin of mine, well, his. It just didn’t make sense.

For apparently no good reason a feeling of calm descended on me, and I realized that this might be a good time for some thinking on my part. Obviously the first thing that came to me was that this might be an interesting SF story to write. Then I thought to myself how stupid it would sound to write a story about walking into a sauna and discovering myself already sitting on the bench. I’ve already written stories that dumb, and I really try to strive for far more imaginative stuff. But s**t. Here I was, and – there I was.

An idea came to me. I got up, opened the inside door then went out the outside door onto the deck. From there I could only see a small part of the parking lot. There were no cars there other than mine. (Mine mine, not his mine.) I started down the wood boardwalk to where I could see the whole parking area, and the road onto the property. Nothing. I ventured a little farther down the driveway, searching the trees for a hidden four-wheeler or a bicycle. Nope. Being the weirdo I am, I looked up. No UFO’s either. About that time I heard a car approaching. I watched from the middle of my driveway as a neighbor who lived about a mile behind me approached. She waved, I waved back, and she slowed to turn into my property. I remembered that I was standing there naked, but what could I do? She’d been at saunas before so she’d seen me naked, but it felt weird standing there in the buff as she pulled up. (What else could I do?)

“Did you want to talk?” she asked innocently, as if I were the type to hang around nude flagging down passers-by.

“No, I was just…” I thought about it. Tell her? Not tell her? Hell, she’d think I was doing drugs or something. “…going to get the mail.” Again I realized how stupid that sounded even as the words fell out of my mouth.

“You’ve got the sauna cranked up, don’t you?”

“Guilty.” I stated flatly.

“I’d join you but I’ve got friends coming over. Oh, and Dave, don’t wave and smile at them when they come by.” She cracked a grin.

I felt stupid. This was so far, far from the quiet, private sauna for which I’d prepared myself.

I went back to the little building, opened the door and looked in. No ‘me-s” in the transition room. Good. I opened the door to the sauna,…and there I sat, still wearing a very s**t-eatin’ grin.

“Alright, spill it. What’s going on here?” I asked.

“You might want to sit down.” He said matter-of-factly. I did. “You… you’re gonna have a hard time with this one.”

“Try me.” I prodded, (Like this guy can make up better stories than me, yah, sure).

“I, am everything you have been. You, are what’s left of you, I, am what’s missing.”

“Talk in riddles. A game?”

“No riddles. I’m you. Think about it. If you had a chance to play a trick on you – a real trick – wouldn’t you screw with your head?”

“So you prove that you’re me by screwing with my head. OK, game’s over. Story’s over. No plot. Nothing happened. You are just a bad piece of s**t science fiction. I know s**t science fiction, buddy, and you’re it.” (At this point I’m not exactly fearful, but I had no idea what this “thing” was. It looked like me, and I got the feeling that this entity no doubt had a serious bag of tricks. ‘Demon’ was my first reaction. Why else would it come looking for me, looking like me? Yah, demon. Something evil and to be feared, possibly outsmarted. Like in the books. I was going to listen carefully to what he said, but not fall into the trap. Damn demons. I’s just a little pissed.

“I am not the demon you’re envisioning. – What? You surprised I can read your thoughts? Get ready. I AM your thoughts.”

“Bullshit.” I thought to myself.

“No bullshit.” He said instantly.

My mind spinning just a bit, I went for the obvious test and thought 9083645.

“9083645. There, now do you believe me?”

I did. Damn demon. I thought e=mc². He repeated it. I recited an old poem by Odgen Nash. He was one word behind.

“OK, a*****e, so who – or what, are you?” I asked.

“I am the energy created by electric impulses involved in opening and closing the synapses in your brain when you think a thought” he paused, “that’s why I can read your mind, I am the electric charges that allowed you to think your last thought.”

I thought about that.

“I’m the smoke after your electrical fires. Think of me as the electrical by-product of your thoughts. Thoughts I feel exist only after you have thought them.”

Now I’m thinking. To myself. Trying to come up with a way to outsmart this, is it a demon? No matter. Let’s see, he gets my thoughts right when I think them. He’s my mental garbage! It’s rape! I don’t want a duplicate mind.

F**k.

“Are you saying,… what are you saying?” I felt violated. He could read my,… no, he was? My thoughts?

“Actually I’m your thought energy. You learned about me in grade school science. Energy can neither be created nor destroyed. I’m the thought-electricity that comes out your energy exhaust pipe.”

“So you’re ’Me’ emissions?” I quipped.

“Perfect.”

“OK, so where have you been until now? Why haven’t I been able to see you before now? What makes this possible?”

“Mainly the right conditions. Very little interference from civilization is what allows your, eventually my, energy to remain to some degree local. Your thoughts float around this place all the time. In the city there are all kinds of confusing electrical, magnetic, sonic, and other pollution in the air. I could never achieve consciousness in that setting. Here, however, you live in relative peace and quiet. Your thoughts are not scattered all over reality. You open your mind to possibilities. It’s also the sauna concentrating the wood-fire energy into a soft heat. It’s the soft heat that allows your own thoughts to congeal and communicate with more of your thoughts, until when you actually walked into the sauna, you intended to sit on that bench. You were imagining yourself enjoying a sauna sitting on that bench when, there we were, all the thoughts you’ve been having in the last few hours, floating around, drawn to the heat energy. Both you, and I, we, your thoughts, were thinking exactly the same thing at exactly the same time.

“Sit on that bench and enjoy the heat.” In that moment, we linked. You kind of linked yourself to your mental exhaust. In any case, here I am.”

I thought about it. “And are you… real, to anyone but me?”

“I am not certain. Good question. A question, of course, that I share. I’m only conscious of what you think. Well, I am what you thought. I have no…”

I’m thinking “this guy’s getting boring. He-it’s just my thoughts from a moment ago. Me redux. Me, the sequil. That’s just too… yecth.

Meanwhile he stopped explaining and sat there with a bored mirror of myself, yes, and damn it that’s exactly what he’s think… Damn, now that’s what he’s thinking.

F**k!”

“I don’t know what to do.” he said, looking at me hoplessly.

I had been sitting in 160 degree sauna for about ten minutes, and it was time to cool down. I got up and stepped outside.

There was no in sight. Good. I laid my towel on the deck and sat down to think and appreciate the view. I opted quickly not to think. Don’t think! The forests and mountains and bay waters all looked right. I cleared my mind, and I widened my perceptions of the time, and place, and beauty that exist - right there - on the deck of my sauna. I tried not to think about the exhaust-pipe guy.

It does not work, concentrating on not thinking of something. It’s just a bad strategy. I kept trying not to think about the fact that the very thought not to think is being thought by… what? Me, two, too?

I took a bottled water from the cooler and took a sip. “There,” I yelled at the window of the sauna, “Did you like that water?” I was pissed. S**t, this is not good. How do I get rid of him? I was still hot, so I tried again. I sat down on my towel overlooking a breathtaking view. Clear my mind. Float on white. Look for the auras. Slight squint. Soft, soft,… that little f****r is still in there.

“Damn it!” I said outloud. I grabbed my towel and said screw it! I’m havin’ a beer. I marched off the deck, down the stairs, along the wooden-dock sidewalk. I went into the f*****g house and I got a beer. Grab two. Aw hell, take the sixpack. F**k it, I’m a couch potato. He’s not stealing my thoughts any… well, not stealing, more like echo-ing or recycling, maybe it’s more like a shadow…

“F**k it! I can’t stop thinking about that… S**t!” I marched back out to the sauna, threw open first the outside, then the inside door. I took a fast, threatening step into the hot … He was gone. I looked around, then angrily searched the 8 foot by 8 foot room, as though someone could hide in there. I stepped into the transition room, then out on the deck. He was gone. Good. F**k it!

“F**k it, f**k it, f**k it! I don’t have a talking exhaust pipe! Noooooo! It was a figment. It did not happen. I am sane. There is no history of mental illness in my family. I dosed off in the sauna and dreamt it.

I dosed off in the sauna and dreamt it.

I dosed off in the sauna and dreamt it.

No worries.

No worries. I did, however, feel it prudent to have the sauna exorcized by a friend from Homer with some strange gobbldy-gook methods. It includes sage and mumbling, and an occasional outburst, spaced with drum thumping. I kind of like the drums part.

So anyway, the situation has been dealt with, and life goes on. The sauna gang still drops by every Tuesday evening (by invite). They also ‘drop by’ Wednesdays, Fridays, Saturday afternoons, all day Sunday, most Mondays,… you get the picture.

Thursdays are pretty much open.

 

Author's Note

Thank you for your input