living the NIGHTMARE

let me just start off with a little story, the story that scarred me for life. i was around 7 or 8, wearing a tie-dye purple dress and matching hat, white stockings, and black shoes. i was in the little girls room in the lunch room of PS 207 (my elementary school). i went into the bathroom, and came out a changed person. i walked out, into a lunch room filled with peers, paraded back to my seat (which was halfway across the lunch room) and that's when someone alerted me to my little friend. my little white friend. hanging from the inside of my underwear, over my stockings, under my dress, and to the floor. toilet paper. i dragged this paper across the lunchroom, and people noticed. and i died. i blame that incident for my fear of public restrooms to this day. my family thinks im nuts, but they don't know the fear.

i will very, very rarely use a public restroom. it must be an emergency. i will only pee at work, limited times per day. this has caused outrageous stomach pains, but it's worth it to me. if someone else comes into the bathroom while im in there, i feel violated. think about it - you are basically sitting there listening to someone else's bodily functions, and maybe smelling them. no fucking thank you. the idea of sharing that very private deed with someone else, is horrifying. this isnt the animal kingdom. this is a workplace. i do not need to know that you pee like a racehorse and then stare at you from across the conference room table.

now i am not just this paranoid because of that one incident (although, that is enough). i am a chronic toilet clogger. and no, it's not why youre thinking. i have literally put 5 squares in a toilet and clogged it! i have been on countless family vacations and had to call the maintenance guy for a plunger. which by the way, why dont hotel rooms come stocked with plungers? why do i have to look a maintenance man in the eye at 3am? why do i have to insist i unclog it, because they ALWAYS want to.

between the embarrassment of that childhood memory and the fear of clogging and no plunger in site. public restrooms are my arch nemesis. and somehow on monday, i faced off with my arch nemesis and i lost.

note this is not actually what happened
just how it felt in that moment.

it was 5:15 on monday. i wanted to use the facilities before i got on the bus to head home. i went in, did my business, and flushed. except, what's this? the toilet didn't flush. so i held the handle down (this may be where i tempted fate). at first the water went down, slowly, very slowly. and i knew something was brewing. then the toilet paper got sucked down, again slowly. then it happened. my literal worst nightmare. the water started to rise. now being a professional clogger, i had seen this before - but never at work. it was going to stop, i was sure of it. but alas, it didnt. at that moment i forgot whether the stall door was a push or pull. i am on my tippy toes, in my own toilet water, panicking.

i walk quietly back to my desk and make an all too familiar phone call to maintenance. then i write a dreaded e-mail to my fellow ladies in the office, alerting them to the shameful disaster that is the bathroom flood. the worst part of it all, no one responded. not even a "thanks for the heads up!" . just judging silence. it's okay, i would've done the same thing.

so basically i will die from a kidney related infection from never using a public restroom again, ever, in life.