The Female Experience
This is dedicated to all women everywhere who have ever had to
deal with a public toilet. And it finally explains to all you men
what takes us so long.
My mother was a fanatic about public toilets. As a little girl,
she'd bring me in the stall, teach me to wad up toilet paper and
wipe the seat. Then, she'd carefully lay strips of toilet paper
to cover the seat. Finally, she'd instruct, "Never, never sit on
a public toilet seat." And she'd demonstrate "The Stance," which
consisted of balancing over the toilet in a sitting position
without actually letting any of your flesh make contact with the
toilet seat. But by this time, I'd have peed down my leg. And
we'd go home.
That was a long time ago. I've had lots of experience with public
toilets since then, but I'm still not particularly fond of public
toilets, especially those with powerful, red-eye sensors. Those
toilets know when you want them to flush. They are psychic
toilets. But I always confuse their psychic ability by following
my mother's advice and assuming The Stance. The Stance is
excruciatingly difficult to maintain when one's bladder is
especially full. This is most likely to occur after watching a
full-length feature film.
During the movie pee, it is nearly impossible to hold The Stance.
You know what I mean. You drink a two liter cup of Diet Coke,
then sit still through a three-hour saga because, for God's sake,
even if you didn't wipe or wash your hands in the bathroom, you'd
still miss the pivotal part of the movie or the second scene, in
which they flash the leading man's naked derriere.
So, you cross your legs and you hold it. And you hold it until
that first credit rolls and you sprint to the bathroom, about
ready to explode all over your internal organs. And at the
bathroom, you find a line of women that makes you think there's a
half-price sale on Mel Gibson's underwear in there.
So, you wait and smile politely at all the other ladies, also
crossing their legs and smiling politely. And you finally get
closer. You check for feet under the stall doors. Every one is
occupied. You hope no one is doing frivolous things behind those
stall doors, like blowing her nose or checking the contents of
her wallet.
Finally, a stall door opens and you dash, nearly knocking down
the woman leaving the stall. You get in to find the door won't
latch. It doesn't matter. You hang your handbag on the door hook,
yank down your pants and assume The Stance.
Relief. More relief. Then your thighs begin to shake. You'd love
to sit down but you certainly hadn't taken time to wipe the seat
or lay toilet paper on it, so you hold The Stance as your thighs
experience a quake that would register an eight on the Richter
scale. To take your mind off it, you reach for the toilet paper.
Might as well be ready when you are done. The toilet paper
dispenser is empty.
Your thighs shake more. You remember the tiny napkin you wiped
your fingers on after eating buttered popcorn. It would have to
do. You crumble it in the puffiest way possible. It is still
smaller than your thumbnail.
Someone pushes open your stall door because the latch doesn't
work and your pocketbook whams you in the head. "Occupied!" you
scream as you reach out for the door, dropping your buttered
popcorn napkin in a puddle and falling backward, directly onto
the toilet seat. You get up quickly, but it's too late. Your bare
bottom has made contact with all the germs and life forms on the
bare seat because YOU never laid down toilet paper, not that
there was any, even if you had enough time to. Your mother would
be utterly ashamed of you if she knew, because her bare bottom
never touched a public toilet seat because, frankly, "You don't
know what kind of diseases you could get."
By this time, the automatic sensor on the back of the toilet is
so confused that it flushes, sending up a stream of water akin to
a fountain and then it suddenly sucks everything down with such
force that you grab onto the toilet paper dispenser for fear of
being dragged to China.
At that point, you give up. You're finished peeing. You're soaked
by the splashing water. You're exhausted. You try to wipe with a
Chicklet wrapper you found in your pocket, then slink out
inconspicuously to the sinks. You can't figure out how to operate
the sinks with the automatic sensors, so you wipe your hands with
spit and a dry paper towel and walk past a line of women, still
waiting, cross-legged and unable to smile politely at this point.
One kind soul at the very end of the line points out that you are
trailing a piece of toilet paper on your shoe as long! as the
Mississippi River. You yank the paper from your shoe, plunk it in
the woman's hand and say warmly, "Here. You might need this."
At this time, you see your spouse, who has entered, used and
exited his bathroom and read a copy of War and Peace while
waiting for you.
"What took you so long?" he asks, annoyed. This is when you kick
him sharply in the shin and go home.
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