Why the bathroom is the freakiest room in the house
It's not a coincidence that horror movies have so many scenes set in the bathroom.
Think about it.
They're usually cold and sterile looking (despite the best efforts of the housekeeper to present an air of cosiness by putting a fluffy slip mat on the tiled floor, or having shower curtains with big googly-eyed goldfish all over them).
They have mirrors - the tools of illusion, and gateways to the ultimate image of our own beings.
They are riddled with ways to kill somebody (or one's self): Water for drowning in, slipping on, electrocuting in; hard, sharp, wipe-clean surfaces; the bathroom cabinet with its pills and its razors.
Many don't have windows, and those that do are blocked out or frosted to enhance privacy. So any natural light is always obscured or otherwise totally absent, leaving the sickly yellow glow of artificial illumination.
And then there's the vulnerability. When you're in the shower, you are wet and you are naked and you have to keep your eyes closed tightly under the running water. And how are you to know whether that's just water tumbling down onto your body with your eyes closed? The roar of the water filling your ears - how will you hear if someone comes in? Someone could be watching you. You'll never know until you open your eyes, and then of course it could all be too late.
The bathroom is invariably the only room in the house where the lock on the door is actually used. This mini house of horrors with it's very own lock.
The bathroom is not a good place to be if you have paranoid delusions.
Think about it.
They're usually cold and sterile looking (despite the best efforts of the housekeeper to present an air of cosiness by putting a fluffy slip mat on the tiled floor, or having shower curtains with big googly-eyed goldfish all over them).
They have mirrors - the tools of illusion, and gateways to the ultimate image of our own beings.
They are riddled with ways to kill somebody (or one's self): Water for drowning in, slipping on, electrocuting in; hard, sharp, wipe-clean surfaces; the bathroom cabinet with its pills and its razors.
Many don't have windows, and those that do are blocked out or frosted to enhance privacy. So any natural light is always obscured or otherwise totally absent, leaving the sickly yellow glow of artificial illumination.
And then there's the vulnerability. When you're in the shower, you are wet and you are naked and you have to keep your eyes closed tightly under the running water. And how are you to know whether that's just water tumbling down onto your body with your eyes closed? The roar of the water filling your ears - how will you hear if someone comes in? Someone could be watching you. You'll never know until you open your eyes, and then of course it could all be too late.
The bathroom is invariably the only room in the house where the lock on the door is actually used. This mini house of horrors with it's very own lock.
The bathroom is not a good place to be if you have paranoid delusions.