I was down in Jupiter last Saturday to see Captain Ringo and help him usher in his birthday, which was July 4. It was a nice little soiree, with stilt walkers, break dancers, great music, beer and treasure. How can you go wrong?
Of course, with vast amounts of beer in play at any one time, the restrooms there were doing a booming business. I myself contributed a fair share to the pot during the festivities, and it was there that I encountered a rare breach of etiquette.
As most men know, you’re not supposed to talk to anyone in the head. Certainly not a stranger. While women go off in pairs and pass the time away talking about men and such, we are to adhere to the Code of Quiet, never talking to another (unless we’re drunk and we know them) and not really even acknowledging that other men are even in the restroom with you.
This code of conduct has been with men for eons. In the days of the outhouse, we enjoyed solitary confinement, just us, our thoughts, an occasional Playboy centerfold and well, “the deed.”
When indoor plumbing came along we figured out quite quickly that several men can use a single bathroom at the same time. If you’re with your young son, you can take up a single stall and formation pee. If there’s a stall and a urinal, you go for the urinal first, the stall is the backup plan. And if there are three desperate souls who just have to pee right this very minute, the sink can be an option.
I know ladies, it’s very different than your world. If a man runs out of toilet paper, he will never ask the guy next to him to hand him some. There is no other guy there to ask (see rule above). Instead, we will wait for him to finish, leave the restroom and grab some ourselves. Usually, we check first before we ever go into a stall, so we’re not ever caught short handed or have to wait while the guy next to us parts with the motherload (which aromatically can be very unpleasant).
If there are three urinals, you always choose the far left or far right, never center. The second guy in chooses the open one farthest from you. It’s only then that you’re allowed to use the center stall. You look straight ahead, admire the grout work and never look over the small partition, if you’re lucky enough to have one. You are never to get caught looking at or admiring another guy’s penis. When you’re through, zip, still looking at the wall. If you acquire eye contact, nod, but don’t smile.
At the wash basin, talking is optional, but only if you’re both at a sink. If one of you is still piddling, you don’t talk. And there was the breach of etiquette. As I unloaded the cargo, the guy at the sink says, “Think it’s going to get busier?”
I had never been to this particular place before. I thought it was busy. I was dumbstruck as to what or how to reply, this so rarely happening. I finally stumbled with a meek, “Yeah, I think so.”
If you’re a guy, you know how uncomfortable this can be. For you ladies, it’s second nature.
Perhaps it’s because a bathroom doesn’t necessarily have to come into play at all for guys. We can improvise wherever we are at the time, especially for the liquidious portion of the performance. To us, a bathroom is still something of a mystery.
I only know this because of my first trip to Key West oh, so many years ago. The Texas Tornado, Connie, booked us into a really nice house on Caroline Street. It was a grand place.
In fact, I think it may have been a bit too grand. For upon going to the restroom in the master bath, I came across an oddity that I only later understood it to be. There, next to the toilet was a second toilet. There was no stall, and the other toilet didn’t have a seat or a lid. I had to investigate further. I turned on what looked like a spigot. Up shoots water.
At first I thought it was a drinking fountain. But the water didn’t arc enough to make it easy to drink from and you had to bend over quite a bit to get to the stream. Then I thought it might be modern art. An Ode to Toilette if you will. That would explain the pretty fountain.
It was neither I was to learn. It was my first bidet. Growing up poor, it would never occur to me that someone actually would want to sit on something that squirted water into that particular part of your anatomy. The only time that happened was when we couldn’t go to the bathroom and my mother would give us an enema.
She would say, “Time for an enema” and we would all part like the Red Sea, trying to escape its horrible wrath. But we couldn’t get too far because she would never tell you until you were in the bathroom and the door was shut. In my family we never got spankings. We got enemas.
“Who shaved the dog’s back?
“Robb did!”
“Time for an enema.”
I think I would have preferred a good spanking.
Somewhere out on the Treasure Coast, writing this on my iPad and not telling you where I’m doing it,
– Robb