Earlier this week, I flew to Santa Barbara to teach coastal folks how to use some of the web applications my co-workers and I built. As usual, the trip divided into periods of extreme stress and of absolute calm, so much calm that I felt at times my head my fall off and roll away, and I would do nothing to stop it.
Most of the stress I incurred manifested from the small, twin-prop airplanes doing wild fish-tail maneuvers on take off and landing, and the troubling stomach aches I endured after eating nothing but rich, crappy food at the airports I visited along the way. The intestinal issues forced me again and again into the horrifying space known as the airport bathroom.
Airport bathrooms are among the worst I’ve ever experienced. Bad food, bad liquor, bumpy flights, stressful business–all factors contributing to blow out after blow out in the restroom. It’s a symphony of scat, and it rarely ceases. So profound is the destruction, I rarely enter a busy airport bathroom where there isn’t a janitor inside, cleaning as necessary.
During my layover in San Francisco I indulged in a cup of clam chowder soup that was both delicious and menacing. I expected the creamy soup to lay like a blanket of heaven in my gut, but instead it plopped down like a heavy rain of curdled cheese. Not five minutes after gnawing the last clam from the last spoonful, I headed for the bathroom.
Surprisingly, the act of standing up quelled my trauma, but left me with a very small need to pee. Since I was already on my way, I decided to continue on and take the preemptive leak.
I was reminded of a saying I heard recently.
The Old Man’s Creed
Never pass a toilet,
Never ignore an erection,
Never trust a fart.
As I moseyed up to the urinal bank, I elected to take the one furthest right of the three, due to the opportunity to roll my carry-on next to it and not have it behind me and the fact that the one on the furthest left was occupied. Simple mens room etiquette compelled me to not take the center one.
A younger man rushed in after me and moved to the center urinal. He fumbled to get both his carry-on into position directly behind him and his trousers loosened. In doing so, he contorted his body to such a degree that his head touched my shoulder momentarily, a massive mistake in any anonymous peeing situation.
But that isn’t the interesting part of this story.
After finding his peace with his luggage and loosing his wank, an unmistakable odor permeated from his direction. This odor will be familiar to anyone who has had sexual relations whilst wearing a condom.
The scent owned a mixture of latex and love so powerful it filled the entire bathroom in seconds. A hush came over the place, as all of us instantly recognized the odor. Appalling as it was, a smell such as this one forces you to travel back in time to an occasion on which you encountered it previously.
Being something of a professional daydreamer, I skipped backwards in the young man’s time to the liaison he just completed. Rather than letting a complete lack of details stop me, I manufactured a scandalous fantasy for him…
The man just finished a celebratory fuck in the back of a mid-size Hertz rental with a co-worker after they landed the biggest account of their lives. He’s been flirting with her for weeks, and feels she’s been flirting back. He’s a little concerned that she might think it was more than just sex because that’s just how he ended up with his current girlfriend. This reminds him that he cannot see his girlfriend until he washes his cock and balls thoroughly and drinks a Redbull.
The coworker is in the ladies room next door wondering how she’s going thwart the young man’s future expectations as she fixes her make-up. She’s been flirting back at him for weeks, but only because he’s the account executive and she’s fairly new to the firm. She’s attracted to him in the way that one is attracted to shade on a summer day, but she knows he has a girlfriend. She also knows that he is aware that she is married and this did not deter his advances. After all, she considers, what kind of man sleeps with a married woman? Not the kind she wants, that much is certain.
I finished my pee before the odorous man and washed my hands quickly. I rushed out of the bathroom and took up a position directly across from the exit, intent on capturing the man’s guilt as he and his coworker exited.
He came out of the restroom moments later and made his way to a nearby gate alone. I followed him a few yards back, looking at my watch and acting nonchalantly. Half way there, his cell phone began ringing. He pulled it out of his pocket, looked at the caller’s info and clicked a button.
I heard him say “hello darling,” through what I imagined was a smile, at which point I stopped following and crossed over to my gate and took a seat.
I pulled out my book and opened it up. I was getting on towards the end of it, and I hoped there were enough pages to last me until I landed back home.
There were.
