In high school, I was second saxophone in the Mighty Beaver Marching Band. The uniform looked like a U.P.S. deliveryman gig mixed with one of those referee outfits you see while watching Australian rugby at 3:00 AM. We looked like Grade A, number one, federally inspected FRUITCAKES.
As a further humiliation, we were forced to wear those kind of white shoes that you can paint. You know, those Earth shoes from the seventies that look like something that you might see on a candy striper in a VD clinic. But we had the exciting prospect: playing the halftime show for the Pittsburgh Steelers versus the Miami Dolphins!
And so here there I was, riding in a brand new bus (its maiden voyage, according to the driver), with sixty five people who would be instantly selected for any episode of Joe Average or remake of Revenge of the Nerds. There was only one problem, other than the conversations involving the how cute the lead singer in Air Supply was: the toilet hadn't been installed properly, and could not flush. The driver told us all this. Unfortunately this was bad news, because we had a three-hour trip ahead of us. "You can use it to do number one, but please wait until we get to Pittsburgh for anything else."
You could have heard a pin drop as each person calculated the likelihood of needing to do "anything else" over the course of the trip. I wasn't worried. One pee would hold me.
About forty-five minutes into the trip, a distinct swirl of hysteria began making its way to the front of the bus. Against the wishes of the management, someone had dropped a giant blowfish! And it was time for yours truly to make water.
I walked to the back of the rolling dweebmobile; I was sure all eyes were on me as I bravely approached the scene of the crime. Sure enough, a floater had been unleashed, and it was bobbing quite happily -- but dangerously close to the seat of throne. I really had to go, so I threw caution to the wind and sat.
I felt a bump and heard a screech and tumbled forward into the wall. I realized that the bus was decelerating quickly and I hoped that we weren't about to be in an accident. But perhaps an accident would have been all right, as I felt the wheels lock up... I turned around and just as I did the contents of the crapper was launched up and out. The result was beyond imagination.
I was covered in green water and brown poop. I cried out as the freezing mudslide made me feel like a pig fallen into a barrel of llama vomit. My face was covered, and my uniform as well. As a final indignity, those very shoes, which only a few minutes before seemed so ugly, were now covered by an indescribable substance and coloring. I instantly reached for the spigot and was reminded that the water supply was useless as the toilet. A tiny trickle oozed out.
The bus, I would learn later, had slammed its brakes to avoid a stalled car on the road. No one was hurt. But someone had heard me and now people were banging on the door of my tragic life, wondering if I had been turned into street pizza. If there had been a window of sufficient width to permit me to crawl like an embarrassed weasel onto the highway below and into the woods across the road, then I'm sure I would have tried it. My mind was working frantically to come up with some solution other than social suicide; but nothing occurred to me. So I sat back down on the pot and finished my pee. But fuel line freeze-up prevented that little scheme, so now I had more than one problem on my hands.
People were really trying to get in the door. I assured them that I was not hurt. Leave me alone for a while. But no, apparently we weren't headed anywhere until my pathetic carcass was inspected. I checked my options.
- Take my clothes off and emerge in my underwear. Definitely a viable option, but not without its own drawback scenarios.
- Refuse to come out of there and make a giant scene. Let an ambulance team come through and get pushed out on a stretcher while covered in a sheet. This seemed plausible.
- Rip the window off and try to jimmy through. Find a body of water and begin living the nomadic life of a hillbilly. Send a postcard to my family letting them know I was fine and had decided to drop out of school and learn how to live off the land.
What I did in the end was not brilliant, but it had the fewest debilitating and therapy-requiring options. I turned my clothes inside out and pranced out like a feudal countess being presented with the papers of debutante. The bus was grotesquely silent as I trudged back to my place up front and splashed down into my seat. I had the gait of a wounded-but-wary mama bear, making it clear that the smallest bit of provocation to uncork a geek fest massacre of shocking historical record.
No therapy was required, although my reputation changed such that no one picked on me ever again. My eyes must have betrayed the idea that I was hanging by a thin thread between the world of suburbia and another of pure violence.
-- Barking Goat
