I’ve written about the perks of being a stay-at-home dad (the women who flirt with you because they think you’re “safe”; the unnecessary kindness of strangers because they think you’re a helpless sack of testosterone). And I’ve obviously written about my various misadventures. But I haven’t really gone into many of the drawbacks of being an actual man in this traditionally female role. More specifically being a man with two daughters. A man who can no longer take his two daughters to the men’s room.
Fortunately I’ve never been the cause for an emergency trip to the bathroom. I think when you’re a parent your system just shuts down while you’re on child watch. Children on the other hand gots to go when they gots to go. On the weekends when we’re out with the family and nature calls, Jen has the privilege of taking the girls to the bathroom. During the week, when Arden was a toddler, I’d take her into the men’s room and line the toilet with enough toilet paper to make her feel like she was sitting on a pillow top bed. Same with Alex. But today, with Arden being 6 and refusing to use the men’s room, yet being too afraid to go to the women’s room herself, I found myself in a bit of bind…
While out on a Costco run with the girls this afternoon Alex said she had to pee. Now if you’ve read this blog long enough you know that Alex has a “lazy bladder,” which means she never has to pee. In fact we have to remind her to pee. So when she said, “Daddy, I gotta pee,” I knew we were in trouble. But knowing what our local Costco’s bathroom looks like I urged Alex to try and make it until we got home. Of course on the way out the door Arden says to me, “You know, I think I gotta go pee too.” I said, “Well I know you can wait until we get home.” But about half way there Alex started to cry. She really had to go. Crap. So I pulled over at an Albertson’s and rushed inside and asked where the bathroom was. We went into the back of the store and I tried to get the girls to use the men’s room. Arden, in her typical sass said, “Maybe if it was a one-er.” But it wasn’t a “one-er.” And Arden wasn’t budging. If the ladies room had been a one-er, this would be a no-brainer, we’d all go into the ladies room, lock the door and do our business. But this was a full-on restroom with multiple stalls and a bevy of sinks. So I asked the girls again if they could wait until we got home. I got a resounding, “No.” So it looked like we were all going into the ladies room.
I knocked on the door and called inside to see if anyone was in there. No response. So I hurried the girls into the handicap stall. Alex went first. When she was finished she insisted she had to wash her hands immediately so I let her out of the stall and put Arden on the pot. Then my biggest fear happened, a woman entered the bathroom and took the stall next to us. I figured I’d just camp out in the stall with Arden until the woman left. But then Alex starts yelling, “I can’t reach the soap!” I decided not to answer because I didn’t want this woman to know I was standing in the stall next to her, trying not to look at the skivvies wrapped around her ankles. But then Alex yelled to me again, “I can’t reach the soap!” So I put on my best Mrs. Doubtfire-meets-Monty Python voice and said, “I’ll be there in a minute, sweetie.” Then Alex said, “Daddy, why are you talking in that funny voice?” The urine stream in the next stall stopped immediately. Alex then said, “Hurry up, Daddy!” But I didn’t want to leave the stall and face this woman. But apparently she didn’t want to leave the stall either. We were at a stall-mate. Then Arden said, “What are we waiting for…DADDY?” I shushed her and hurried out of the stall and said, “Let’s go!” The girls said in unison, “We have to wash our hands!” Why did I raise such germaphobes? I quickly scrubbed their hands and dragged them out of the bathroom protesting, “We need to dry our hands too!” I shot back, “We’re air-drying them today!” As we left a trail of water in aisle six I looked back and saw a security guard walking after us. I don’t know if I was paranoid, or if the guy just needed a box of ninety-nine cents strawberries. Either way I got in the car and sped off as fast as I could.
