{"id":250,"date":"2023-08-03T21:52:37","date_gmt":"2023-08-03T21:52:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.314stories.com\/?page_id=250"},"modified":"2023-08-03T21:52:37","modified_gmt":"2023-08-03T21:52:37","slug":"a-treatise-on-public-restrooms","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.314stories.com\/?page_id=250","title":{"rendered":"A Treatise on Public Restrooms"},"content":{"rendered":"

For firm evidence of our close lineage to the rest of the primate kingdom, journey into a nearby public restroom.\u00a0 Man\u2019s baby steps away from the apes come clear in these tiled and divided bastions of excremental real estate.\u00a0 Need property?\u00a0 You have a cubicle-sized section of glistening tile floor and a hole in the ground?!\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Bathrooms have come a long way since the hole-in-the-ground outhouse, dusted with lime and freshened by winter breezes, but the people using them have <\/span>not<\/span><\/i>.<\/span><\/p>\n

On a recent visit to one such public venue I spied rich lines of smeared fecal matter along the walls of a holding area.\u00a0 The chimpanzee exhibit at the zoo?\u00a0 The work of enraged gorillas, balling up their own feces?\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Neither.<\/span><\/p>\n

This particular display was in an elementary school.\u00a0 Of course, \u201cno one\u201d knew anything about it\u2014they rarely do in such situations\u2014yet everyone seemed equally grossed-out and enthralled.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Over the next few weeks, the decorative finger-painting appeared again and again.\u00a0 Was this always the same person?\u00a0 Some pint-sized fecal ninja creeping in broad daylight, using ancient techniques of the Orient to conceal his identity and his wrongdoings?\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Were these lemming-like copycat crimes of others who wanted to \u201cpaint\u201d like all those monkeys at the zoo?\u00a0 When the elephants at the zoo paint, using pastels and brushes gripped in their trunks, this artwork is for sale in the specialty boutiques and as big-ticket items at zoo auctions.\u00a0 When the chimps or gorillas do it, why does it not attract the same interest?<\/span><\/p>\n

For the true immersion experience, you must visit the public restroom in an airport.\u00a0 Consider yourself Jane Goodall in Gombe, doing the first on-site and in-person study of chimp behavior.\u00a0 Short of my college dorm bathroom–sledgehammered out of commission by a drunken sophomore–these are the quintessential places to study degenerate primates in action.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

That bathroom, by the way, was also where a sophomore vomited in the stall next to me, then pierced the air with a war whoop cry of, \u201cYes, perfect score!\u00a0 All bodily fluids in this stall <\/span>and<\/span><\/i> the shower.\u00a0 Awesome.\u201d\u00a0 I dared not ask in which stall he showered, though I carefully timed all of my visits to avoid his at all costs; lest I too become infected with some strange obsession to go forth and pollute.<\/span><\/p>\n

A visit to the restroom in the airport can open your eyes to humanity\u2019s wondrous and vivid connections to our ape ancestors.\u00a0 Men smirk at the long line of frustrated women snaking its way out of the ladies room, then turn that sloping corner into the men\u2019s area and inhale the rich scent of dozens of successive bowel movements.\u00a0 Men stand at urinals, scratching backsides; old men loosen belts and drop pants, exposing ancient garters and knobby protrusions of knees.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The air is thick with splattery sounds.\u00a0 Noses pulse with the acrid odor of hundreds of simultaneously released colons.\u00a0 There is no line in this bathroom because it is a descent into sub-human existence.\u00a0 Man as we knew him has become extinct. Replaced by vague shadows of businessmen and truckers and fathers escaping children.\u00a0 All of them break wind with gusto, grunting in similar passions. There <\/span>is<\/span><\/i> no line because no one could willingly subject himself to this olfactory assault.<\/span><\/p>\n

Communication, what little there is, reduced to grunts and nods. \u00a0 Modern cave paintings, scratched into classic blue-painted stalls, behind doors, above toilet paper dispensers.\u00a0 Epitaphs of brilliant men, dying and leaving a piece of himself behind. .\u00a0 There may even be evidence of man\u2019s first journey into written language: \u201cHere I sit\u2026,\u201d or \u201cFor BJ tap foot on\u2026.\u201d\u00a0 Such rare finds are archaeological history, fodder for bathroom fables.\u00a0 Fuel for bedtime stories of fathers to sons.\u00a0 The (un)brief(ed) history of mankind\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Still, witness small, ironic glimpses of manners.\u00a0 Entering an almost empty restroom might call for the classic \u201cstall-cough.\u201d\u00a0 Non-verbal language we all understand to mean, \u201cMe here.\u201d\u00a0 Never mind the horrid smell draping your nose and face–the smell you will wear on your flight to the next city; the one that will cause your seat-mate to wonder if you ever learned the proper wiping etiquette–is a subtle clue.\u00a0 This coincides with a prolific and juicy evacuation covered, briefly, by another cough.\u00a0 \u201cMe here.\u00a0 Me-not-do.\u00a0 You-hear-things.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

This brings me back to the elementary school restroom.\u00a0 Late one April there was a disturbance in the 1st and 2nd grade wing.\u00a0 First and second grade boys enjoying their limited freedom and experimenting freely with materials on hand?\u00a0 No, this was slightly different.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Someone had used the urinal, suspended as it was, from the wall, for an entirely different form of (solid) evacuation.\u00a0 Consider the mechanics of this event: what small boy of 6 or 7 is tall enough to do this?\u00a0 How does one accomplish this without being caught? \u00a0 Perhaps most frightening\u2014what if this was a completely logical maneuver for this boy, ending with him returning to class satisfied with a job well done?<\/span><\/p>\n

I suppose we must start all burgeoning primates at young ages if they are to make the downward spiral toward de-evolution complete.\u00a0 There must be forward\u2013in this case, downward\u2013progress in any cycle of growth.\u00a0 What better place than the public restrooms of our nation\u2019s elementary schools?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For firm evidence of our close lineage to the rest of the primate kingdom, journey into a nearby public restroom.\u00a0 Man\u2019s baby steps away from the apes come clear in these tiled and divided bastions of excremental real estate.\u00a0 Need property?\u00a0 You have a cubicle-sized section of glistening tile floor…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":179,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-250","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.314stories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/250","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.314stories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.314stories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.314stories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.314stories.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=250"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.314stories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/250\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":251,"href":"https:\/\/www.314stories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/250\/revisions\/251"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.314stories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/179"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.314stories.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}