I like routine and predictability, but re-starting this blog was not planned. Every post so far has been on a whim. I have no agenda. But for someone who makes incessant to-do lists each week and day, I want some sort of box to check every week regarding this blog. As I was taking potential suitors into consideration, I thought about some of the stories I’ve alluded to or told in previous posts. Here was the impetus for my latest installment, Sunday Storytime.
Sit cross-legged on the classroom carpet scraps square, turn your voices off, and picture me sitting in the teacher-chair and awkwardly trying to read and show pictures simultaneously.
Preface: This story acknowledges the existence of human waste and the sometimes uncontrollable nature of human waste.
Once upon a time…
My job requires me to work on the weekends quite often. We live close to my place of employment and we also have one car, so I will usually have The H chauffeur me to/from work. There are so many perks about this: not paying for parking, often times treated to coffee, sweet serenades to the latest Just Timberlake hit on the radio, someone to scrape (currently plow) the snow off the car, etc. There are certain streets in town we tend to avoid because you are better off hopping one-legged with a blindfold down it, than driving. (Yes, that is a bit dramatic, but this is storytime!)
This chilly Saturday morning around this time last year, we didn’t avoid one of the said streets. We were stuck at one of those horrible stoplights where the streets are not perpendicular so you have to sit through an eternity of red lights just for you to get your 3 seconds of green light fame. We have a beautiful public library in town, almost always teeming with families and individuals looking to check out the next Fifty Shades of the Scarlet Letter, or attend a legitimate storytime put on by the friendly library staff. As we sat at this light, I’m sure we chatted about something really important. Actually, I’m almost positive we were complaining incessantly about said stoplight. As the light turned green and the line of traffic started to eek forward (one second delay after it turns green for every car in front of you, says Dad), I look to the sidewalk. I see only one person. She has a grocery bag and then a grocery cart. In areas like where we live, people walk a most places, so they invest in fun little contraptions such as these to help them cart around their days’ purchases. It really is convenient on so many levels. One bag and one cart, that is all she has. There are cars parked along the side of the street, parallel parked because urban areas would have it no other way (dang them!).
Then she drops her bag and lets go of her cart. Oh no, is she alright?! Then she drops her pants. One hop down the curb to a black American-made sedan.The bumper of a kind-hearted library lover as her toilet seat, she relieves herself. I will use the word relieves, but that is keeping things G-rated. Really, people, the image of what I saw is seared into my photographic memory for-ev-er. I will not write the details that I might tell you in person (depending on our level of intimacy and immaturity). Some of you would get the nitty-gritty, and you’d like it.
I turned to the then fiancé, jaw-dropped and speechless. And he asks, “Did she just do what I think she did?” I nod my head, still silent. Approximately thirty seconds later we’re at my job, and now I’ve broken my silence with uncontrollable, ab-cramping laughter. Not knowing my co-workers as well as I do now, I think they thought I came in intoxicated, especially with the story I claimed I just witnessed. For the first hour of work I would have it under control, then giggle like a kid, hoping that a customer did not need help while I composed myself for the 100th time.
We avoid this street now, for more than just the annoying stop-light. And, I vow never to park my car outside the library, not just because I can’t parallel park, but because my car is white and, well, toilets are white. So, boys and girls, this is the story about how my mile-ish commute turned into one of my most memorable road trips.
The End…
Considerations 