Thursday, December 4, 2003

Can you stall a second and give me directions to TP Topia?

Words are only symbols strung together to represent some ideal, or emotion. They notion towards something that is alone indescribable by normal means. Definitions are things which give a new, unknown word a meaning by using words that are already known. And bathrooms, they are convenient places where one can get some nice quality time alone.

The most interesting thought once you are alone in a bathroom stall, or even alone in your own personal bathroom, is a wonder as to who has been here before, sitting upon the toilet, or perhaps standing aside the toilet, and what has gone on there. It is also quite an unsettling thought as well, for it goes into one of the most personal matters—the very acts of defecation and urination. Another interesting thing to think about is what the persons before you had thought of in this same bathroom you are in.

Evidence can be found as to what, exactly, people have thought of as they sit on the toilet, or stand in front of it, by the scrawlings made from pen, pencil, or any sharp item.

I have often found going into a bathroom is like going into another plane of existence. Once inside, the door usually slams shut behind you if it is at a school bathroom. It just has an eerie feeling as the door shuts as if by some force. Yes, it's only gravity shutting the door, but I think it's still eerie in a sense. Especially if there's no one in the bathroom, and it's just quiet to the point where the only thing you can hear is yourself. It's then that I wonder if I'm going to see something out of the corner of my eye, or maybe something is going to jump out of nowhere at me.

Call it paranoia, I call it an insane muster of imagination. Ever since I was young I've had this imagination, and I guess it's one of the things that makes me as erratic as I can be at times. I remember when I was really young that I couldn't sleep because I thought the devil was going to get me.

Another memory that stands so vividly in my mind is I absolutely swear I remember my Dad coming in my room and beating me, or something to this extent. And then soon after that, my Dad came in again, and I remember asking him if he really did that, and him completely denying it, and was kind as ever. It's amazing how reality and fantasy can just come together as if they are tied into one another. I'm certain at this point I just dreamed what happened, but never have I had such a vivid dream as that. Except for maybe two other times, and that is all.

Bathrooms always get these kind of thoughts going into my mind, especially if it's an empty public one. It is the quiet, and it's also just how grimy a bathroom feels altogether. It is like a coma to your eyes; they are always so white if they're a public one, and then the toilets are always full of urine, or sometimes even feces, as if to give the bathroom an unclean and dirty feeling. And it just seems to bring these kinds of things out of you.

The thoughts also seem to go to things that could happen in a bathroom. Especially in an empty one. I'm sure that many murders have happened in bathrooms, many dirty thoughts, and many things I don't even want to get into. It's just rational that something which is so quiet and dirty will catalyst you to thoughts which normally don't come to you. I think it's also the entire factor of some place such as a school bathroom not being a common place you visit. That too plays a role in altering how you are thinking.

I do think I'm paranoid. My imagination just does that to me.

In a bathroom, as you walk in a stall and shut the door, and you look on the sides of the square which encloses you , there is sometimes words that jump at you from all sides. The words stare at you, and you stare at them, and you can't help but read them. It has been said that we don't even look at a word for each letter it uses to spell, but we look at it as a whole. I believe this is quite true, especially as we become more and more familiar with words and use them more often.

These phrases strewn about a bathroom only lead to make you wonder more what people could have possibly been thinking as they sat in this stall where you are now sitting, preparing to do what must be done. This also makes you roll your eyes at the lack of useless things you'll find.

Don't get it wrong, though. There's some really interesting phrases to be found in bathrooms. But as I found, by going into the bathrooms I could here at school, there isn't much interesting in a high schooler's mind, at least. Most phrases appeared to me to be carved by some pubescent boy that had raging hormones that, for some reason, he could not control as he was going to the bathroom and alone to his thoughts.

I can just imagine some zit-infested baboon with wide, gaping eyes, and buck teeth sitting on a toilet with a pen in hand just glaring away at the wall, thinking deeply to himself like he's in some kind of twisted psychiatric evaluation. I can also imagine him drooling and salivating at his thoughts as he begins to scribble his horrid script upon the wall. Thoughts like, Man do I want Michelle right now swirling from his head onto the stall's wall like some beastial instinct. And as he writes them he hums in an entirely rabid fan boy fashion, his eyes fixed fazedly on the wall as if that right there is Michelle's naked form dancing merrily for him, up and down, and smiling as she looks over her shoulder.

Then suddenly, as if a comet just hit him square in the head and took out his brain, Mr. Baboon finally comes to the realization that that is not Ms. Michelle dancing naked there, but it is simply his pencil waggling up and down all excited like a dog. And Baboo just sighs, and he lets his eyes drift up to the ceiling in an extremely dreamy fashion. And soon Baboo leaves his sheltered home, where now scribbled on the wall stands, "Michelle, I want your heart for mine, want to feel you inside, want to know you MOTHER F-ING WANT ME DOWN AND DIRTY."

I've noticed that there's always an f-word somewhere in the tangle of words you'll find. It's people that are pubescent, by rule of thumb, that write these. Don't ever listen to them, either. Why teenagers feel it's fun to say f-this and f-that all the time I have yet to find out. I especially hate those kinds of people that say the f-word every single sentence. It's like they're afflicted with a speech impediment, and for some odd reason, it has ended up going into F-ingal Syndrome. I think these people have to be some of those who write f-this and that on the walls of stalls.

I can just picture Mr. F-you Wong right now. He'd be some tall kid, maybe. Or maybe short. And he's got this certain mean look about him. And as he's walking down the hall, he's just yelling endlessly, "F-ing F I got in that f-ing class, what the f-ing bizatch is this f-ing f-ery. What the f! I ain't f-ing ever going to f-ing go to f-ing class one more f-ing time. Holy f-ing mother of f-ing f-ery. F-ing f-er."

At this point I would like to take out a sniper rifle and shove it directly in Mr. F-you Wong's face, and say something like, "Now what do you have to say?'

And I can completely imagine his mouth beginning to open like an opening gate, and then him going on and on again with his f-this and f-that. At this time I would look at him like he was some poor waif if an animal, and I'd not hesitate to pull the trigger and allow him to flinch as the only thing that flew out was a large flag which said upon it, "F-ery is f-ing."

Whatever the case is with these messages upon bathroom stalls, I shall always be there to read them. For I am the bathroom decoder of the ages. I'm also a paranoid-ridden camel. I thirst for the feelings of paranoia and nostalgia.

Next time you see me in the hall, maybe you could tell me if Baboo ever found his Michelle. I know I haven't. But at least I'm not scribbling on walls like some inane yak.
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