I'm from Northern California, and my family is all that that implies: meditation, no red meat, Japanese cars, and vegetables. Lots and lots of vegetables. I poop more when I eat white bread because my body processes fiber better than the starch.
Last week, when I was home for spring break, my mom took me to the Wednesday night Oneness Movement (OM) potluck. Because I am a student, I eat a lot at potlucks. This inevitably leads to poop. So there I was, happily stuffing myself with sushi, organic brown rice pasta, steamed asparagus, dolmas, and aronia berry juice, listening to my mom chat with the other people at the table about going to India and learning to act as "garden hoses" for the enlightening energy known as deeksha.
Inevitably the pressure moved from my stomach to my colon, and I decided it was time to take a trip upstairs to the bathroom. Realize, now, that this event was taking place in a new-age church with very old-age plumbing, and that the women's room happened to be situated directly above the potluck hall.
I dumped a semi-satisfying load and then flushed. The turd went down the pipe, but I didn't quite feel done. I went across the hall to the small library to encourage my bowels (books make me need to poop). I browsed the titles for a while, taking in the collection of bibles, books on how to meditate, and holistic medicine guides. Eventually I felt enough of an urge that I went back into the bathroom and pinched out another few little pieces of poop. I flushed, and realized that my initial turd hadn't completely cleared the old plumbing. The plunger, though, was in a sad, sad state, with worn-out rubber that kept the cup in a perpetually inverted configuration. I shrugged and left the toilet bowl filled to the brim with water. There were other bathrooms in the building.
About a half-hour later, everyone sat down to watch a DVD in which Sri Bhagavan answered questions such as, "What is the difference between an avatar and one who is enlightened?" Suddenly we began to hear a pit-pit-pit-pit-pit-pit-pit sound. I looked behind me to see people scrambling to bring trashcans underneath several spots where water was dripping through the ceiling.
We continued to watch the DVD, moving chairs and placing bowls on the floor as new leaks sprang up. I suspected that I was to blame for the disruption. Indeed -- I slipped upstairs to find a maintenance crew aggressively snaking, plunging, and mopping in the bathroom where I had just dumped my load.
I went back downstairs and whispered in my mom's ear, "It's my fault. I clogged the toilet."
She responded, "How often do you poop?"
I whispered back, "About every day or every other day."
(She had reason to be concerned. As a child, I had a toilet phobia and frequently went a week without pooping. A big component of my problem was the social fear of clogging up toilets. The full account can be read here.)
Eventually the water stopped dripping and the chairs got reconfigured for the deeksha process. People sat in concentric circles, and over the course of about forty-five minutes we received enlightening energy as the deeksha givers came around and touched their hands to our head chakras. I had a very exciting, moving spiritual experience that I won't get into for the purpose of this story; but when they were done, a woman stood up and said, "Well, I hope you enjoyed our little flood of enlightenment this evening."