When I was thirteen, my father moved his law practice into a small building that he shared with a few other professionals. During that particular summer, I would visit him in his new digs for the father-and-son lunch thing. On one occasion, while waiting for him to finish up some work, I had to pee, and headed down the hall to find the men's room.

I found the door to the signless facility ajar. Once inside, I discovered the second most bizarre bathroom setup I've ever encountered in my life. (This [1] being the first.) This one-user room had a sink and one exposed toilet up a set of steep steps on an elevated platform. Talk about your thrones! I snickered as I climbed the stairs and stood over this royal set-up to hang it out and let fly with the lemonade.

On another visit my needs were of the backdoor variety, so I made my way to the throne room, actually relishing the lordly image of myself doing the doo. Once again I found the door ajar. I locked it and climbed the mountain to drop a boulder. I had pretty much sent the lengthy remains of the day to a watery grave when I heard the sound of keys in the lock. Someone was coming in, come hell or high water. Fascinated, I just sat there, frozen in anticipation.

Seconds later, my father's pretty young secretary stood in the doorway, keys in hand, gasping in surprise at the sight of me with pants around my ankles and legs spread to reveal my sausage and hard-boiled eggs in all their pubescent glory. Then her surprise turned to a a brief, giddy laugh -- and let me head off my critics here and say that, no, I don't think she was commenting on my young package -- and she turned on her high heels and shut the door behind her. I thought the whole thing was equally surprising and amusing, particularly since I couldn't figure out why she had a key to the men's room.

I quickly stood up, wiped, sent my brown boy to the nearby Mississippi River, and headed back to my father's office. Evidently his secretary had had time to inform him of her unexpected potty encounter because he sat me down, looked me in the eye, and said forcefully, "Don't you know you were using the ladies' room, boy? What were you thinking?"

Suddenly, the blood rushed to my brain and it all made sense. There was no sign, and there was no urinal. Just that solitary throne that had fascinated me so, almost issuing a mental challenge to me the first time I saw it. "Shit here," it seemed to be saying to me, "and you will be shitting like a king." I explained to my father that there was no sign and that the door had been unlocked; he accepted that and thankfully dwelt no further on the incident.

The mens' room, it turned out, was around a corridor I had not bothered to explore because I had found the unmarked ladies' room; though it was puzzling why the ladies' had been left unlocked on at least two occasions. Had that not occurred, this shameless teenager with a randy imagination would never have been so misled.

So on my next visit I got it into my head that I would face up to my unintentional misdeed like a man, and apologize to the secretary. But here's the tragic part: I was denied that opportunity because she was killed in a car wreck a short time later. For some reason I felt guilty about the whole thing, although that sentiment defies all logic. I had done nothing but mount the wrong throne to take a titillating poop; and she had done nothing wrong but unlock the door as usual to tend to her needs. Still, I felt connected to her in some inexplicable way, and I will never forget the image of her pretty face and infectious laughter at discovering my young ass on the pot. As time went on, that image actually served me well, since it was far more pleasant than picturing her dying in that smash-up.

I like to think of her now as my pooping angel, watching over my many drops and plops with heavenly approval from a new throne even higher than her old one.

-- The Big Wiper [2]