A Man’s Quest to his Safe Haven
Photo by jimwhimpey
So, I’ve pretty much been rocking out with food poisoning for the last day and a half, and it’s been moderately awful. Needless to say, I needed a break at work today.
Mondays are typically awful, but Monday after two consecutive nights of drinking past 3am is a little more like a volunteer proctology job at a sex offender facility. Suddenly my weekend dietary schedule of consuming nothing but beer, vodka, and whiskey until a Sunday afternoon filled with buffalo chicken and eggs didn’t seem like such a great idea. So I went to my safe haven.
See sometimes you just get too stressed and need a break. I don’t smoke, so I can’t weasel my way into those extra sleaze breaks. So I go to the bathroom. Even if I don’t take a shit, I’ve learned that if you sit your ass on the seat the right way and squeeze it just a bit to the right or left, making the seat scrape the bowl, you can make a sound that sounds a little bit like squeezing one out.
There’s a man, be he myth or legend, that is my hero. You see, one day I found the fourth floor bathroom out of necessity. I sprinted up there like Shitbrake in American Pie. Once releasing the demons, I looked to my right and saw papers stuffed above the roll o’ TP. They were printed sports pages from the Boston Herald website. Some mythical legend realized he could get this for free and read it. We’ve never met, but he’s pretty much my hero. So today, I soldier on in, stomach feeling as if I’m about to die. Some dickbag has my stall.
My safe haven.
So I take the one next to it. I try, but it just doesn’t feel right. I don’t get any reading material or the comfort of that seat I’ve gotten to know so well. Then I decide maybe he’s almost done and I can put one of those sanitary things over it and grab my seat. Then it hits me. After about two minutes, I realize this guy’s not shitting. I don’t even hear games being played on a phone. He’s fucking shit-shy. He thinks he’s going to wait me out to continue shitting in peace. WELL I SAY FUCK THAT. I have taken a lot of crap in this world. I will deal with laughs when I say the Packers can make the playoffs. I will deal with the Athletics building hope then nose-diving in mediocrity. I will deal with every woman I ever date reminding me how much I suck. I will deal with my mom thinking I’m completely incapable of doing anything. I will deal with Fenway being taken over by tools and douchebags. I will deal with no one giving a shit about the Bruins. I will deal with paying into social security that I’ll never get to use. I will deal with paying higher excise tax than my stepfather whose car is worth about ten grand more than mine. But I will not give up my safe haven.
I drew my line in the fucking sand.
I out waited him. My stomach made noises I never heard before and I felt it wanted to shit through my mouth and throw up out my ass. I sweated. I wanted to cry. I stared at this one beat up tile on the ground and entered a Zen Buddhist like state. But I would not give in.
Sweat poured off my forehead and I wanted to cry. We must have sat there for half an hour. BUT Ol’ SHITSHY FINALLY CRACKED. He exploded like a volcano. And I heard it all.
Today I stood my ground. I kept the one thing worth fighting for in life. My upstairs bathroom with the sports pages. My safe haven. And no one’s taking that away from me.
