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Musings from Moyieboy ... |
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Confessions of a bathroom reader |
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August 9, 2017 |
By Ken Carpenter
I can’t remember how old I was when I started
taking my passion for reading behind the locked
door of the family bathroom. Probably as soon as
I learned to read, for it seemed like a waste of
time to sit there doing nothing.
My first and, shockingly, my favorite bathroom
reading material was the fine print on the back
of a Bag Balm can. I had never imagined that
chapped udders could be so interesting. Believe
me, if my bosoms ever become inflamed I will
know exactly what to do about it.
I became acquainted with the ingredients and
marketing ploys of every aerosol product we
owned. There was no printed word on the shelf
that was safe from my prying eyes.
Yes, I became an addict, before I even knew the
meaning of the word.
When I was growing up our home never had more
than one bathroom, which meant that my toilet
reading habits did not add to my popularity
within the family unit. If my siblings saw me
headed in that direction they would scramble to
beat me to the door, even if they didn’t feel
the urge to do anything.
As the years passed by my addiction grew
stronger, and nothing grieved me more than
having to use a public bathroom that suffered
from a shortage of legible graffiti. It may not
be high art, but it has its place in society.
The most impressive graffiti I was ever honored
to read said, in three-inch letters,
“Coincidence is the master of men.”
Try to argue with that.
When I left home and moved into a college
dormitory, I started to realize that I was not
the only one suffering from this, as I was to
find out, not so strange affliction. I spied
more than one guy smuggling reading material
into the stalls, as they were spying me.
One student, a confirmed believer in all things
audacious, would march to the can singing and
pounding a magazine against his leg. More often
than not he would read his favorite passages
aloud as he carried on his business.
He brought us all out of the closet, and in no
time the days of sneaking around with a book
stuck down your pants were in the past. It
ceased to be a shameful thing and became the
sign of a rebel, albeit a rebel without a cause.
There are different tastes in all things, and it
is no different behind the bathroom door.
Personally I prefer sports, trivia and gossip,
but I know others who will only sink their teeth
into front-page political bunk.
There is now a Bathroom Reader’s Institute,
which pumps out paperback books filled with
tasty anecdotes for the discerning fan of such
fare.
I never imagined as I guiltily perused the back
of a Bag Balm can that someday such things would
be fit for public consumption.
It only makes sense though. I figure my
ring-around-the-rump time has pumped my brain
full of enough useful tidbits to equal four
years of college.
And for better than forty years it has had me
prepared for an attack of those pesky chapped
mammaries. |
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