Horrific or Humiliating
“From even the greatest of horrors, irony is seldom absent.” – H. P. Lovecraft
This day began like most days for me, half a pot of coffee to start and two more large cups just to keep the buzz going. Cindy and I set out for town to run some errands, a 45 minute drive. The whole time I could feel the slow ballooning of my bladder. Not an emergency yet, still got plenty of room…probably.
Once we finished our chores we headed for lunch at a sit-down restaurant even though we were in a rush to get home. I couldn’t wait! I was starving….aaaaaand frankly my bladder was pushing maximum density. We were seated immediately and having dined there before, we were able to order right away, which was a darn good thing because my eyeballs were floating at this point. The waitress took my order first:
“I’ll have the steak, medium rare.”, I clamored with some urgency.
“What sides do you want?….. You get two.”, she added, impatiently.
I panicked, my mind set on impending relief, I wasn’t prepared for side-dish ordering and told her:
“Whatever the first two on the menu are!” and quickly slid out of the booth making my way to the restroom post-haste.
There are two gender-specific bathrooms, one for each and apparently, only one toilet in each. I grabbed the handle of the “MEN” door; locked! Uuuugh! I can hear groaning and grunting from within and smelled a horrific odor wafting into the narrow hallway where the restrooms were located. ‘What the hell was going on in there?’ A rhetorical question for sure, I really didn’t need and or want to know.
Well, times being what they are let’s just see if the “WOMEN” door is unlocked. I gave a light tap and it gives enough to let me know I now have options.
I look around, no one walking this way or even looking. I’ll only be 15 to 20 seconds at most. I hit the door latch and backed into the restroom as I looked down the stinky hall to make sure no one was approaching and no one was.
As I closed the door in front of me, the odor became overwhelming. How could that be? I should be isolated from whatever was happening next door. But the source of the aroma, as it turned out, was right behind me!
As I turned towards the commode, I became witness to a horror show. What looked like a giant dirty russet potato set upon a plop of baked beans was floating at the toilet rim. Water and poo particles had obviously cascaded down the toilet bowl onto the floor along with wads of toilet paper. Someone had unloaded the chuck from their chuckwagon in a most ghastly and what should be considered a criminal manner. There’s no way they couldn’t know they clogged the toilet.
‘On second thought, I’ll just wait for the men’s room to.. ‘<Clack.. clack.. clack..clack> The dreadful sound of the door handle being jiggled frantically from the other side followed by rapid fire knocking. “Oh Jesus!” I’m not ALWAYS a religious man but, when I am, it’s reserved for moments like this. I can’t walk out now that someone’s outside, they’ll think I destroyed the bathroom!
<Clack.. clack.. clack..clack> ‘Knock.. knock.. knock’
My mind ran with the image of 20 women lined up outside the door impatiently waiting, rolling their eyes, some doing the ‘pee-pee shuffle’. A Karen or two marching over to the restaurant manager to have him break the door in to make entry. I was breaking out in a cold sweat, time to take some deep breaths…no, no, not going to do that, the gasses might kill me.
Even if I did manage to flee the scene undetected it’s only natural that upon discovering this gross mistreatment of the ladies restroom they’d be looking for the culprit among the diners. A bunch of Nancy Drews scouring the restaurant looking for the guilty party. If any of them made eye contact with me it’d be over, I’d look guilty just for knowing about this. ‘There! That man over there, he knows something! Get him!’ Maybe I’m just over thinking this.
<Clack.. clack.. clack..clack> ‘Knock.. knock.. knock’
For a moment I was conflicted. I mean, at this point in my life I don’t have much dignity left anyway and certainly don’t care what other people think of me but, this isn’t about me. This is about not tarnishing the impeccable image of the male gender everywhere! This is not how we’re going down, this won’t be how our story ends. All of a sudden I’m Braveheart giving a rally cry to an army of one. I have a great hill to climb and, apparently, a mountain to flush. This crime scene needs to be cleaned up and fast.
<Clack.. clack.. clack..clack> ‘Knock.. knock.. knock’
I grab the bottle of hand soap and begin pumping it in large mounds in my hands when I realize the pump is making a very loud ‘farty’ noise with each plunge of the pump. This wasn’t helping my cause the least bit.
<Clack.. clack.. clack..clack> ‘Knock.. knock.. knock’
I throw the soap on and around the toilet, on the floor, the sink, the walls, frankly, everywhere. Using the large roll of brown paper towels I wrapped both of my shoes and began shuffling around soaking up as much soapy poo water as possible.
I turned the trash can on it’s side and kicked the towels into the can. I tear off more and more paper towels from the roll and continue shuffling about making ‘ffffft..ffffft..ffffft’ noises repeating this process over and over until there’s almost no paper towel on the roll. I can only imagine what the person(s) outside the door thought I was wiping. However, all of this is for nothing if I can’t get the potato and beans down. All I could think at the time is how grateful I was that this wasn’t Taco Bell. Thank God for small miracles.
<Clack.. clack.. clack..clack> ‘Knock.. knock.. knock’
I raised my foot to the flush-lever and apprehensively rested it there.. silently praying.. “please, please, please”.. I closed my eyes, like that would help, well, I guess my PTSD flashbacks won’t include the visuals of a brown potpourri waterfall, just the sound of screaming from everyone outside the door as the brown tide makes it’s way under the door into the hallway. I pushed down, heard the gutteral sound of rushing water and then the melodious sound of a vacuum sucking down the reprocessed meal.
<Clack.. clack.. clack..clack> ‘Knock.. knock.. knock’
Using the last of the paper towel I made a large wad and wiped the toilet rim and detailed the floor around the bowl. My mind distracted by the thought of Cindy finding out what went on in here and knowing I would never hear the end of it, “What! I can’t get you to clean the bathroom at home but you’re scrubbing public toilets for free!!”
<Clack.. clack.. clack..clack> ‘Knock.. knock.. knock’
Finally done! Having flung all the hand soap around the bathroom I scraped some off the wall adjacent the sink and leisurely washed my hands as if nothing happened. I wiped my hands on my shirt since I sock-mopped the floor with every last shred of paper. Time to exit with some dignity.
<Clack.. clack..>..I grabbed the door handle and pulled the door open. There was a small child with her mother on the other side. Mom was crouched down so her head was at eye-level with her daughter, both wide-eyed and frantic they pushed passed me without looking up apologizing profusely for their S.W.A.T. like entry.
I stood in disbelief realizing that I could have just opened the door earlier and as the duo entered I could have just rushed out and slammed the door behind me before they realized what they had walked into. Oh well, good luck to you both with no toilet paper or paper towels. With a deep sigh of relief I made my way back to the dining table. Men the world round had no idea what I sacrificed for them and never would.
As I sat down, Cindy asked, “Everything come out okay? What took you so long?”
At that moment, I realized that during my adrenaline rushed bathroom renovation I had completely forgotten to go. I pondered an array of possible answers and decided on the truth, well, sort of: “Some guy barricaded himself in the men’s room, I finally gave up on waiting.”
Cindy asked why I didn’t just use the ladies room, no one would care. I responded truthfully, “Oh, I’ll never use the ladies room, ever….” … again!
Ahh, well at least I got back just in time for lunch. The waitress set my plate down in front of me. My head dropped, I just stared at my plate. The waitress asked if everything was okay. ‘I just spent the last 15 minutes detailing the women’s bathroom of your restaurant and attempting to flush a giant tur.. ‘”Yes, everything is fine, thank you.”, I said, feeling my stomach start to churn.
Apparently the first two side dishes on the menu: baked beans and baked potato.
