I will never forget the time I went with a girlfriend, Kara, to the beach in North Carolina. It was a long drive with her parents to their trailer on the shore. I was ready to get out of the tight back seat and get into the sunshine. I opened up my door, planted my feet on the gravel and declared "It's great to be able to walk again!" Then I took one step and fell face first into the gravel. It hurt, but the humor trumped the pain.
Kara and I were immediately bored in typical teenage fashion. She remembered that there was an arcade not too far away where we could find some entertainment, like cute boys. So we started walking. And we kept walking. Another thing young girls without driver's licenses forget is that what takes 2 minutes in a car is probably 2 miles away. I was getting sick from the heat and the direct sun light. I started to feel that unmistakable gurgle in my stomach. I walked along calmly, looking for anyplace I might be able to use the facilities. No port-a-potties, no businesses, no nothing... Just the ocean and cute condos. So I asked my friend if she thought it was much further because there was an emergency on our hands. We stopped to figure out what to do. I knew I wasn't going to make it all the way back to her trailer and the arcade was nowhere in sight. We discussed the ocean, but even though fish do it, I was pretty sure I couldn't just crap all over myself in the Atlantic. But I had to go--HAD to. So I spotted a darling little condo with a clothesline out front. I thought, a sweet, little old lady probably lives here. She'll let me use her bathroom. So, I knocked. A man answered the door, but I had no time to reconsider. I told him I needed to use his bathroom and that my friend would wait outside, that everything was on the up-and-up. He looked suspicious, but opened the door wider. The place was so small that you couldn't help but see the bathroom from the front door. What I also saw was an entire family. An entire family reuniting at the beach; way too many people for this cramped living space. I ducked into the bathroom without looking anyone in the eye. I was already dying of embarrassment before I even got the door locked and my pants down, but there was no turning back now. I heard whispering by the family in the awkward silence.
They quickly discovered that I wasn't lying about my needs when the flood gates opened and noises poured from me that such a small girl is unlikely to make. I felt that I was in there for an eternity--the pain wouldn't stop and I knew I wasn't done. I wish I had been wise enough to offer the courtesy flush, but instead I violated a tiny, private bathroom with at least 20 stunned people on the other side of a thin door. Then again, they didn't offer me a courtesy radio play or any distracting sound.
I emerged an eternity later with a meek "Sorry. Thank you.", as I was being ushered out the door as a pest would be shooed. I could feel the eyes burning into me and sensed that I had just ruined something important. Kara and I began walking back to her place without needing to discuss the plan. After a few moments she finally burst out laughing and we laughed the whole way back. I still wonder if this is a story that they tell at their family reunions in North Carolina. Hopefully they are laughing about it by now. I will always be the girl who desecrated their gathering by defecating all over their joy. I learned something that day about not judging a book by its cover. Clotheslines don't always mean what you think...
