One Man's Junk is Another Man's Treasure; The Boy Cootie Paradox

I am a Nervous Pooper, if by Nervous Pooper you mean I can talk about poop with ease.
I can write about poop and laugh about poop without reservation.
Poop is relevant. Poop is funny. Poop always wins (in Apples to Apples, unless you have roadkill, or anything that’s festering.)

The actual act of pooping and its resultant results make me uncomfortably uncomfortable.


Hotels are hell.

My entire clan is seven feet from the outside of the bathroom door, and hotel fans, if not absent entirely, are disappointingly q u i e t.

I’d like to take a righteous stand and claim that my concern for my loved ones is about their comfort.
But it’s not.
I make them leave the room. Go to the lobby, play in the elevator, or wander the halls.
I don’t care.
I gotta Make.
And it’s one of My Rules.


God forbid I should plug a toilet, but it has happened.
And Mr. has plunged.

We don’t speak of it, or we do, because I can talk about poop with ease. I can write about poop and laugh about poop without reservation.
Poop is relevant. Poop is funny. Poop always wins (in Apples to Apples, unless you have biker gangs, or boobies.)

The actual act of pooping and its resultant results make me uncomfortably uncomfortable.

Like the notion of Mr. SEEING my poop in the act of plunging. [shudder]


Mr. and I talk about Smoke ‘n Mirrors, the façade I create when I go full bore on makeup and hair.
We talk about my Wobbly Bits, stretch marks and crepe paper skin.
My sideburns are an excellent topic, as is my ‘stache.

We talk about the guy at the auction house who called me “Gorgeous” for two years instead of using my name.
We talk about Auction Guy’s unvarying remarks about my Beauty.
We talk about the night he said to Mr., “You are One Lucky Man.”

We talk about “One Lucky Man” living the dream with my ceaseless chatter, waning estrogen production, endless health problems, and lack of industriousness.
Mr.’s life is THAT kind of fairy tale.

Still, we talk about my Allure.

We talk about the Great Mysteries of our romance.

We talk like Mr. has never heard me burp loudly, like he’s never seen me sporting a unibrow or my legs in desperate need of a shave.

We carry on like he’s never emptied my puke basin, my bathroom garbage or my shower drain.

We do NOT talk about my poop and whether or not he’s seen it.
Ever.

Although we did talk about Sprinkler Sphincter once when he cleaned up after a particularly rough bout of stomach flu.
It was the first time I’d heard the phrase (and you KNOW how I love a good euphemism.)
At the time I was unaffected by Crapper’s Shame.
I had the flu.
I was more about the whining and the certainty that I was dying.


When we rented the house on Edisto we had No Idea that the bathroom opened into the great room. Short of confining the Dolls and Darlings to their bedrooms I was not gonna get any privacy for The Deed.
There was NO fan.
I know; right?

But there was a Man Cave.

There was a downstairs apartment.

Mr. and I can’t manage in a queen-sized bed, and he’d kindly agreed to sleep downstairs.

Mr. is Monkish. His abode quickly became "The Man Cave", with his clothes and needfuls in tidy piles, good little soldiers in orderly rows.

‘Til I had to go Number Two.
And a Poop Cave was born.

Mr.’s bathroom was very popular.

The Poop Cave may have saved our family.
I’m gonna say that it did.
The Poop Cave saved our family.
There, I said it.


Flash forward to home.
Calvin (my 3YO daycare kid) learned to pee standing up.

Time travel in lew of a segue, and flash backward to his first day at Miss Kelly’s House of Torture daycare.

I was told that Calvin was Pretty Much Potty Trained. Read; he hardly ever pissed and/or soiled hisself.
Guh-reat.

I was told that he would Mention It Late, and it’d be best if while sprinting for the can I’d strip him from the waist down.
Cuz he’s scared of Falling In and needs to spread his legs while he Goes.
Puh-lease.

He tinkled at Miss Kelly’s House of Torture daycare with his pants at his knees. And his knees firmly locked together.
He made craptastically large BMs in the Thinker Pose, pants ankled appropriately, legs modestly closed.
Cuz I’ll tell ya; I am NOT going eye-to-eye with this boy’s micro junk as he does unspeakable deeds spread-eagled on the can.

He never had a significant mishap.
Yay for potty training. If potty training equals Miss Kelly explaining the consequences of the alternative. Threateningly. With furrowed brow.


I was apprehensive about pottying from day one, but it pales in comparison to my anxiety now.

Little Man Junk is disgusting.

When Calvin was new here, I worried about Making It In Time.
I worried about lifting him onto the potty. He’s hugantic. My bathroom's small and awkward.

I worried about the stream snaking out between the seat and the rim, which it did on occasion, but we adjusted.
We became familiar if not comfortable, and our few bathroom messes were quickly a thing of the past.

Just when I thought we had a handle [ahem] on his peepee, Calvin Discovered It. Like Discovered equals Loves. "It" being his Metamorphic Little Man Junk.

He’s not my kid, and I don’t necessarily embrace Freudian psychology, so I’m not worried about the long term effects of Miss Kelly scolding about the touching of the LMJ.
I use appropriate childcare language exactly as I would if Calvin was my own child.
“Holy hell! Get your hands out of there/off that thing. That’s sickening.” is highly effective.

Cuz it really. Freaks. Me. Out.


How can my marital world rock so completely around the Man Business of my Studly Mr. and I can’t handle the day to day workings of this boy’s Little Friend?

I’m ineffective as a daycare provider.
I’m failing.
I’m at a loss. (Which is Remarkable because you may or may not have heard; I am The Smartest Woman in the Universe.)

How do I make Calvin understand?
Even when he pees it’s the folding and sqeezing that produces a stream that baptizes everything in, on, and around the toilet.

So Calvin is sitting when he pees at Miss Kelly’s house.

He’ll be scarred for life if I can’t impress upon him that he’s a shameless pig.
I've got to make him understand that his frequent junk touching is socially unacceptable and revolting.
Like pooping; it should only be done when you’re alone.

Preferably someplace with a Really Loud Fan.