Dooce is one of my favorite blogs; I check it daily. I’ve been a follower for about 4 years now, and am always touched or entertained. Dooce took a well-deserved vacation last week and had guest blogger’s posting in her absence. The Rite of Passage post by Jim Griffioen of Sweet Juniper on Friday 6.13 just tickled my fancy. The essence is the torment of exposing his young daughter to the repugnance of public mens' rooms, and his daughter’s transition to managing the more enlightened public women’s restrooms. His description of the one he had been in had me snorting coffee from my nose as I laughed delightedly at his descriptive prose, and mumbled disagreeably about his view of the women’s restroom. There are indeed those oases of fresh scent permeating the air and plump chairs pulled invitingly up to counters with flattering light. Unfortunately, I find the majority of public lavatories often fall into the category of "ick."
It pains me to soil Mr. Griffioen’s idealistic view of the women’s lavatory, but more often than not, it is just as skanky as the men’s .
For years I have been lamenting, to my husband and anyone else within earshot, the abhorrent behavior exhibited by women in public restrooms. I get that no one wants to sit on the icky seat -- germs and all that -- but if you stand up to pee and piddle on the seat, have the decency to wipe it off, for crying out loud. Bring your own toilet seat covers, if you must. But clean up after yourselves. Someone will inevitably come in behind you to use the restroom, and urine left on the seat is just rank.
If standing and squatting on the seat is your style, please wipe off the footprints and splatters prior to your departure. Here is a link (courtesy of Smart Bitches Trashy Books) that can help you learn to pee standing up, or find those elusive travel accessory for your toilet needs.
If the urgency calls to fill the pot, flush the toilet. Make sure it flushes, please. No one likes to walk into a stall and see the brown water left behind by the half flush. Have some sympathy to those of that come along.
Then there is the practice of wrapping and disposing of sanitary items if the situation arises. Do they have to be left on the floor in a crumpled heap, barely wrapped? Eeewwwww, truly. If the in-stall receptacle is full, let’s be adults and carry them to another garbage can. We all know what they are; no need for embarrassment, ladies.
Graffiti is not unique to the men’s rooms, either. Women are definitely the meaner of the species and comments are just as vulgar. How does one respond to the question coming loudly from the closed stall door, “Mom. Someone wrote on the wall here that Jenny’s a sucking ho. What’s that?”
It does make me wonder about all those bathrooms in the offenders' homes. Do they leave piss on the toilet seat and floor in their bathrooms? Deliberately leave floaters waiting for the unsuspecting lid-lifter to find and frighten? If leaving toilet paper on the floor of the bathroom at home is unacceptable, why is it okay in public restrooms?
Giggles is now well versed in how to navigate the bio-hazard that is a public women’s lavatory. When she was younger while traveling, the unavoidable need to stop somewhere for relief would occur. And into the fray we would go. Wipes to clean off any undetectable left over splatters and invisible germs. Draping lengths of toilet paper over the exposed seating, all without fingers touching the seat. Carefully resting her delicate behind on the covered seat without dislodging the paper to tinkle. We make certain that all TP goes into the toilet for flushing. Washing hands in the sink vigorously to remove any possible contamination, using the paper towel to turn off the handle and open the door. Finally, the hand sanitizer for extra caution. The dangers have been met and conquered once again.
As for Giggles, she has a pretty advanced sense of smell and has been known to walk into a women’s room, stop suddenly, nose wrinkling, and decide on the spot that she can hold it until we get to the hotel. I applaud her discretion and bladder capacity.
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