Andy Young: Wrong place, wrong time, wrongly suspected

By Andy Young

Certain persons had better hope practitioners of Christianity, Islam, and Judaism have a mistaken impression of the afterlife. That’s because if there actually is a Hell, some people are going to be spending eternity sharing space with Adolf Hitler, Jeffrey Dahmer, and Osama bin Laden in cramped quarters equipped with barbed wire walls, rusty-nail floors, acid-spewing showers, and all where wintertime temperatures rarely drop below 180 degrees.

Litterers, be they cretins who toss garbage out their car windows or pedestrian trash strewers unwilling to find an appropriate receptacle in which to deposit their rubbish are also amongst those doomed to an eternity of perpetual suffering in torrid, sociopath-infested surroundings.

Another contingent doomed to eternal damnation: people who don’t clean up the odorous, often squishy deposits their pets leave on sidewalks, or on other surfaces where human beings frequently enjoy hikes, ambles, or strolls.

And after an incident last week there’s at least one additional person who would, were I in charge, be bound for eternal damnation. I don’t know this individual’s name, but whoever it is attends and/or is employed at the high school where I teach. Relating the specifics of the incident that has aroused my ire may be a bit indelicate but refusing to acknowledge life’s more unpleasant aspects doesn't make them any less real.

It was shortly after lunch when I received a call from nature that quickly escalated from gentle to strident. Fortunately, my classroom is conveniently located near the public boy’s bathroom. Right next door to it is a private faculty bathroom that requires a key, and next to that one-seat, lockable facility is an identical one that’s open to any student or adult, assuming it’s vacant when the need to use it arises.

Given the nature of my business I felt privacy was called for, and since the faculty restroom was occupied, I headed for the open-to-anyone facility, which thankfully was vacant.

I entered, locked the door behind me, and almost gagged. The previous occupant had neglected to do their due diligence prior to leaving, and as a result the inside of the toilet bowl looked and smelled like a porta-potty that hadn’t been emptied since last month.

Many people reading these words have clogged a toilet at one time or another.

Depending on the situation it can be embarrassing, demeaning, mortifying, or sometimes all three simultaneously. But despite the humiliation factor, such plights need to be dealt with quickly, and with neither a plunger, a bottle of Drano, or a plumber’s snake available, I backed away from the horrible scene of the crime, opened the door, and left unobtrusively, intending to go seek a custodian.

But what I didn’t notice until it was too late was a girl coming up the hall, apparently needing to use the facilities. Opening the door that had just closed behind me, she entered the bathroom. Seconds later she backed out, gasping and horrified. I turned to see what was the matter. Our eyes met. Then hers narrowed. Presuming I was responsible for the nightmarish sight she’d just witnessed, she gave me the sort of utterly disgusted look one normally reserves only for drug-dealing child molesters or child-molesting drug dealers.

Whoever left the unflushed toilet that led to my undeserved humiliation has no reason to fear, for I am neither a violent nor unusually vengeful person. In fact, the only request I’d have for the craven invertebrate whose cowardice put me in a terribly awkward position is for them to please give my regards to Adolf, Jeffrey, and Osama when (not if) they next see them. <