Years ago, when I first started traveling in my sales territory, I had the opportunity to take look up the son of a family friend who was enrolled in the ROTC program at Texas A&M. He lived in a barracks-like dorm in College Station, as many of the cadets did. As I visited with him in his room one morning between classes, giving him some news of home, I realized that I had to go drop a load. So I interrupted our conversation and asked where the head was.
There were two communal crappers at either end of the long hallway. I chose the one just a few doors down from my friend's room. What I encountered when I walked in was your typical spartan, military bathroom. This one had a large communal shower to the rightand a urinal trough to the left running the length of a row of six open stalls on the opposite wall. The stalls had very low partitions -- so low, in fact, that you could easily see the guy sitting next to you from the waist up. Many who have been in the military can vouch for facilities like this (or even more extreme) in boot camp.
Behind and above these bare rear-end receptacles was a long pipe with rolls of toilet paper locked onto it, which meant that if you weren't a standing wiper before you walked in and used the facilities, you were by the time you walked out. You had a choice of twisting around and grabbing some asswipe and turning back to face forward, or turning around and facing the pipe while you wiped.
But I digress -- enough matters of tidying up. Let's return to what happened after I walked into this stark latrine, took a seat on one of the far-end pots, and began to release my load. A young cadet entered in his starched khaki best, staked out a position three stalls down, and unbuckled his belt. He had lowered his briefs and trousers to his thighs when what I later surmised to be an upperclassman came in and moved crisply to the urinal trough in front of both of us.
Immediately the cadet snapped to attention. The entire time the upperclassman drained his lizard, the cadet recited what sounded like some sort of hazing ritual over and over, his pants at semi-half mast. It became a blur after a while, but I recall it went something like this: "Good morning, Mr. (Smith), sir, good morning. Permission, please, sir, to stand at attention while you respectfully empty your bladder, sir, yessir!"
Every once in a while, the upperclassman would turn his head and smirk at the cadet. He also gave me a cursory glance, probably wondering who the hell I was. But since I wasn't dressed in any sort of military issue, he probably figured I was just visiting somebody and ignored me. Finally he finished shakin' his thang and left the building, so to speak. The cadet then returned to trying to lower his trousers so he could relieve himself.
No sooner had he gotten them down around his shins then another upperclassman appeared, heading for the trough as well. Again the cadet snapped to attention and went into his spiel: "Good morning, Mr. (Brown), sir, good morning. Permission, please, sir, to stand at attention while you respectfully empty your bladder, sir, yessir!" And once more, the cadet stood rigidly upright while his superior took his leak.
By this point I was becoming quite amused by the entire situation. I wondered if this poor plebe was ever going to get to take his shit. There is practically nothing worse than having to hold it in when you desperately have to go.
Of course, we all know that most things come in threes. So yes, the cadet had actually completely dropped trou to the floor and had seated himself and had even emitted a forceful fart when yet a third upperclassman sauntered in for an appearance at the trough. For the final time, the cadet snapped to, this go-round virtually naked from the waist down, repeating the ritual and waiting patiently for the upperclassman to leave him in peace.
After we were alone, I couldn't resist saying something to him after he had resumed his seat. "Is shitting always this difficult around here?" I asked.
With his face reddening and a hint of a grunt in his voice, he said, "When you're first year, yes!"
I said nothing more, allowing him to unleash his beast in silence; the look of relief on his face was worth a thousand words. We ended up wiping at approximately the same time, contorting ourselves to reach up and grab a handful from that blasted pipe.
When I got back to my friend's room I told him all about what had happened. He confirmed that every plebe had to go through this Shittus Interruptus routine. It wasn't at all unusual, he said, for a row of plebes to pop up and down all through the morning, depending upon who walked in on whom. It didn't matter whether you had one halfway out or you were foaming at the butt or you were in the midst of a greasy wipe -- you had to stop what you were doing that instant and pay your respects, or suffer the consequences. And you could always tell who outranked whom. The higher the rank, the more likely that a shitter would get to remain seated no matter who walked in.
I suppose someone who was Shameful wouldn't have seen the humor in the situation or even been able to use such facilities, but it was business as usual for me, considering my history of using open stalls in high school and college. Still, I'm glad I didn't have to memorize some deferential speech and mouth it over and over again every time I had to do the doo. Shittus Interruptus could give your sphincter and system entirely the wrong message.
