Bathrooms and Blunders

The other day, I had an existential crisis at five in the morning. It was triggered by the nearly-spent toilet paper roll. I was where you might guess I was when being triggered by a roll of toilet paper.

Initially, I was just a little disgruntled by it being empty again, then another internal voice kicked in and started to harass me with rapidly escalating thoughts of,

“It’s always empty.”

“You keep replacing it.”

“What is the point?”

“What is the point of anything??”

“WHAT IS YOUR PURPOSE IN LIFE??!”

My heart rate legitimately started to climb, but I reined it in.

“We are not doing this right now,” another internal voice said. “This is too early for an existential crisis, and we are not having one over toilet paper.”

Crisis averted.

It wasn’t a groundbreaking moment, it didn’t linger in my thoughts, and I wasn’t inspired to do anything other than write about it (and change the roll) because that particular internal voice gets out of hand sometimes and deserves to be mocked for it.

But it reminded me about conversations I’ve had recently with family and friends about how we think. Since I find these things truly fascinating, I want you to, also.

Consider my sister. Sister does not dialogue in her head at all. Her brain produces an orderly map of concepts, like on crime shows when they have a wall full of pictures connected with pins and yarn. It sounds a little less fun than having internal dialogue nattering away at you, but a whole lot more organized and effective. That’s why she’s making the big bucks as a banker and I’m sitting here writing about it for free.

So if you ever wonder how I come up with some of this stuff I write, just know that it all ping-pongs around in my head, free of charge. All I have to do is reach out, grab a handful of the spaghetti, and toss it on the blog here for you.

Anyway, if you take nothing else away from this topic, just know that the phrase ‘internal dialogue’ will get you fewer worried looks than ‘voices in my head’.

“But they are the exact same thing,” a voice whispers to you from the void between your ears.

And that’s okay, because that’s just how some brains work.

Since I came on strong with a restroom anecdote, I might as well continue on the theme...

The ranching industry isn’t exactly a female-dominated one. I’m not going to sit here and squawk about gender equality, because I know full well that cows treat us all equally until we earn their respect (or don’t). But there is one very inequitable component to life that leaves outdoorsy women vulnerable every day.

We cannot pee standing up.

I really need you to be sympathetic to my cause here. Don’t be shy; let’s just air this all out.

When I say this problem leaves us vulnerable, I mean really vulnerable. When a female commits to this duty, she pretty much hog ties her knees together with her own clothes, fully moons Mother Nature (we pray it is only her we are mooning), and balances there with incredible skill, an almost-fetal-positioned little ball of fear. That’s just the psychological aspect. I won’t even go into the dangers of thorns, burrs, stubble, wasps, and ants (and before you ask, these are all dangers that I or a loved one have personally encountered). Out in the pasture, I often have a horse to hold in this time of trial. Lately, it's been Barb. Sometimes Barb is sympathetic and will take the time to relieve herself, too. Other times, she harasses me by tugging at the reins and whinnying. Other times, she just looks at me as can be seen in the picture for this post.

Anyway, when we say we need to relieve ourselves, the relief cannot come until the entire process is over and we have come victoriously out of hiding.

I’m sorry if I have over-shared, but I’m just doing my part to spread awareness of the gender gap people are talking about.

So now that you know more details than you signed up for, it’s time for the first of my tales...

This one happened a few years ago, now, so I feel a little less uncomfortable about bringing it to light. I was at a friend’s farm for a campfire-type party one evening. It was back before the days of fire bans and socializing bans, so we were kosher, don’t worry.

I didn’t want to make the long drive back so late in the night, so I had packed a blanket and planned to crash in the car. At the time, my friend was living in a camper trailer in the same yard as his parents. During the evening, the small camper bathroom was a viable option. But when everyone had left and Friend was off to crash in the camper in a bed that was directly beside the washroom... well, I had sorely missed my last opportunity to use the facilities.

I sat, in some consternation, in the back of my car as I dwelt on the problem before me. Waiting it out was not an option. I had enjoyed the dying embers of the fire too much - the camaraderie and easy companionship of the last few people who remained had been too sweet to disrupt with the rude intrusion of a full bladder.

So there I was, with an ultra-full bladder and no where to go.

I considered going part-way home; just far enough to find a gas station. But then I’d have to phone at an uncouth hour and let my parents know I changed my plans and would be travelling. I also didn’t think I could make it to a gas station.

So I formulated a plan.

Step one would be to cross my legs and hold it until Friend turned his camper lights off. Fortunately, he didn’t dilly-dally too much. As I waited, I calculated my most discreet angle. My best bet would be to open the door and go in the cover of both the door and the car. This would help block me from Friend’s camper and Friend’s Parents’ house. I encountered only one tiny hitch in this plan: interior lights. However, I discovered that the interior lights will turn off once the door is open for a few minutes. So I cracked the door and sat in the light for a while, pretending to be doing something while actually being afraid of not only my impending vulnerability, but also the potential moths I was attracting with the interior lights and opened door.

Finally, darkness fell. I opened the door... eased out... stopped to listen and look around for a while...

Silence was key. Everyone was asleep, and no one had reason to look out at the car. I just had to let the silence continue. I would be shrouded by silence and darkness and the car and the car door...

But I was horribly betrayed. In that most vulnerable of positions, as I shifted ever so slightly to look insecurely over my shoulder, the jeans that hog-tied me at the knees shifted, also.

The car keys in the pocket of those jeans shifted, too.

The car keys with the panic button. The panic button that helps old people identify their beige Buicks from all the other old people’s beige Buicks in the parking lots of the Co-ops they frequent.

My discreet deed was not so discreet anymore.

The headlights of the beige Buick flashed brightly, and the interior lights flicked on to cast a spotlight upon me, but that wasn’t even the worst of it. The horn. Oh, the horn.

It began blaring in time with the flashing headlights, and it shattered the silence.

It almost made me shattered, too.

In one fluid motion (but not unwanted fluid, fortunately), I pulled up, dived into the car, and slammed the door behind me. From my prone position, I ripped the keys from my pocket and hit the guilty button again, silencing the car. I stayed laying, out of sight, until the lights turned off again. It seemed to take forever, but was also not long enough to slow my heart rate.

I kicked off my shoes, put the darn keys in one, wrapped myself in my blanket, and went to sleep. My bladder was empty enough to get through, and I was not about to make another attempt.

They say don’t squat with your spurs on, but from personal experience with both, I think it’s far more important to remember: don’t squat with your fob in your pocket.

Now we move on to my other story, which doesn’t involve spurs or fobs, but does involve a friendly neighbourhood watch.

Mom, Dad, and I were all travelling to pick up my mare from her special date with a stud up by the city last year. The farm we were heading to is in a little pocket of acreage-y area. There are a fair few yards around, but also some good pastures with bushes in between. None of us like to show up at a near-stranger’s place and make a beeline for their bathroom, so we decided to stop on the road just before we got there. The grid roads were clear, and there was a bush right by the ditch. Perfect.

Mom and I wove our way into the bush, splitting off for our own separate spots, while the patriarchy conveniently stood beside the truck.

Mom has this super power of being able to relieve herself in about twenty seconds flat. I don’t know how she does it. It takes me at least that long just to trick my body into not thinking I’m in fight or flight mode, so it will carry out the simple task before it. In any case, both she and Dad were back in the truck already when the vehicle turned towards us on the crossroads about a quarter mile away. They shouted to hurry, but I had already glimpsed the danger through the trees. I wove back through the trees and dashed to the truck.

“Drive!” I said, desperately. The vehicle was pulling up quickly. “Drive!!”

But Dad did not comply.

The vehicle made to pass us, and I thought, well, that’s not so bad I guess. I’ll just look away and probably never interact with this random stranger in my life.

But then the random stranger stopped, his window down, seemingly bent upon interaction.

He asked us rather gruffly what we were up to, mentioning that he was from around there, and that his neighbour owned the land that he saw us on, and that it was posted and had video surveillance.

I was mortified.

Dad chuckled a bit and explained,

“These two,” he pointed at me and Mom, throwing us under the bus, as though he hadn’t used his male privilege to just stand beside the truck to do the same, “just had to go to the bathroom; so they only went up to this first bush here. Hopefully your neighbour’s cameras aren’t pointed there! We’re actually headed just up here, to one of your neighbours, to pick up a mare.”

The guy laughed a bit, then.

“Oh, I see! I was just keeping an eye out; we get plenty of thieves out this way, so we try to watch out for each other out here. Have a good day, then!”

The guy drove on, probably checking his mirror to make sure we turned in at the stud owner’s place like we said we would.

I thought it was insolent of him to bid us good day when he had contributed so largely to its ruin.

Since Dad threw me and Mom under the bus on that occasion, it’s time to leave the bathroom topics and bring to light a couple of times that he messed up just a bit. It’s stories like these that inspire me to have an anonymous blog. I know that for the most part, anyone reading this knows who I am... but you guys would never tell, right?

One day last spring, Dad and I were hauling a cattle oiler out to a pasture with a flat deck trailer behind the truck. We came to a T in the road and turned left. Only a couple hundred yards up, the road was built through a big slough. Geese not only filled the slough on either side, but were also having a chill time just camping out on the road. Not a few geese, either. Hundreds. Hundreds of them just on the road.

What I would have done as we turned the corner towards the geese is not speed up the truck. I would have used my already-slowed momentum to just coast along until they flew off and cleared the way.

I like to err on the side of caution.

Dad would have us believe he never errs at all.

I can only imagine he sped up for what he thought would be dramatic effect. He also likes to stress people out.

He was two for two in my books, because there was plenty of dramatic effect and stress.

He really wasn’t going all that fast when we got to the flock of birds (allegedly). He explained later that he thought they would start to lift and it would look cool as we cruised right under the blanket of birds.

What actually happened was the birds didn’t start to lift.

Instead of coasting under a blanket of white geese, it felt more like a down blanket blew up and there were feathers everywhere. And the feathers were geese. And we were the bomb.

We were going not that fast (allegedly), but definitely, it became clear, too fast.

I squinted my eyes and put my arms in front of my face in case one came to embrace me through the front windshield. I'm not a huge fan of birds outside of documentaries, so one of them coming through the windshield like the Kool-Aid Man wouldn't have been good for my psyche. I got the impression that Dad was laughing at me between his grimaces, so I wished a teeny bit that one would come through his side of the window and french kiss that smugness away. It would take a mouth full of goose to make Dad eat crow.

Anyway, geese were bouncing off the hood, windshield, mirrors, and sides of the truck. I couldn’t concentrate on the road, and I’m not even sure if Dad could see it, because there just kept being more and more goose confusion. Most of the geese that bounced on the front of the truck were able to flop their way to being airborne after they rolled off the roof. An unfortunate few survived the initial roll only to be schmucked by the oiler we were hauling, or the trailer tires we pulled behind.

It was carnage, and not a little terrifying for all involved.

Except Dad, who probably thought that, of all the times his plans have not gone quite as he thought they would, this was one of the more interesting.

Dad will probably not drive into a flock of geese like that again. Aside from breaking a bit of the grill on his truck, it’s not exactly a legal way of hunting birds (not that that is what he intended).

Another thing Dad will not do is second-guess himself when he’s digging a hole near a phone line.

We have been picking away at some prep work that precedes building a fence on the new land. After fencing the steep hills along a creek a couple years ago, this new land seems pretty tame, but there are still a few inconveniently-placed sloughs right where the fence has to go. We had a mulcher come in to clean the trees up, but Dad has been using the big payloader to level out sharp dips and build roads through sloughs.

There were two long sloughs that had narrow parts in them which we decided to build the fence through, rather than go around. Dad spent a couple days in the loader, digging big holes to make small roads. He did an excellent job, and has even filled the holes in and cultivated them, so you can hardly tell they were there.

But I’m not here to compliment his handiwork.

I’m here to tell you that the man sat in that loader for five minutes at one of the holes, contemplating where exactly the phone line ran.

He could see the marker posts, and knew generally where it was, but here is his thought process...

“Well the markers are over there,” he thought, “but if I was putting a phone line in, I would have come straight through here... where I am digging right now... but who knows what those donkeys did? I’ll just peel back a little at a time...”

And so he did, as delicately as he could with a three-tonne bucket. In fact, he was so careful about scraping, that he was able to scrape right along the top of the cable without breaking it. Until he was dissatisfied with the amount of dirt in the bucket, and so dug into the ground at the last moment. That did it. The cable was broken.

I know you’re supposed to call before you dig, but this phone line really just goes out to a pasture, has never worked very well in the past anyway (perhaps because farmers keep not calling before they dig), and is currently not even hooked up. For all these reasons, Dad performed a splice, shovel, and shut-up operation.

Except that I am telling you, now.

But you’d never tell, right?