Irresistible Bliss

Today at school, we had low water pressure due to some construction nowhere near school. I don’t know, don’t ask me. All I know is that when I got there, I really had to pee, and all of the bathrooms were closed. I walked from one to the next to find that they were all closed. Then I finally found an open one. In the locker room by the pool. I found another near the coffee shop, but they kept closing them to clean them. Rumor has it there was one open in the library, too. These open bathrooms were all on the first floor. My classes? All 2nd and 3rd floor.

I freak out when I’m somewhere without a bathroom. When I used to run as many as 7 miles at a time, it was a huge challenge for me because if there’s a porta-potty? It’s probably nasty. If there’s not? Then I’m in really big trouble, because I drink tons of water when I run. This usually meant I had to pound water on the way to the place I’d be running, stopping along the way at a bathroom or two if there wasn’t going to be one where I’d be. And then immediately heading to one as soon as I finished. Most of the time I could handle it during the run. But not all of the time.

I hate being at events or places of business without a bathroom, or with only one bathroom, or with a broken bathroom. At times when we’ve had a broken toilet at home? I had to leave. And most of the time, that’s what it comes down to.

If there’s no bathroom here I’m going to have to leave.

I really considered blowing off the rest of my 2 hour math class after taking my test today because the thought of being stuck on a floor with no bathroom for that long was almost too much to bear. And the weird part about that? I rarely ever have to go to the bathroom during that class. Just the idea that I couldn’t go made me have to go.

So what does this say about me from a psychological standpoint? I have absolutely no idea. My best guesses? I have a tiny bladder, I worry too much over everything, and I’m a little bit crazy.

The plus side of the bathroom situation today? I ran into a friend I hadn’t seen since last semester. Because my journey to an open bathroom landed me in a totally different place to study than usual, and her journey to an open bathroom took her right to me.

And while that’s really pretty awesome and cosmic… they’d better have all the toilets working on Friday or I’m going to have to go home.

While waiting for my psych class to start this morning, I started to ponder my own theories about personality. The first thing that popped into my head is what does it say about me that I’m always so early to my Personality Theories class? The reason I’m as early as I am is because I dropped the class I had before it. So I arrive at school about an hour before it starts. I like to beat the un-moving staircase traffic, so I head to this class about 20 minutes before it starts. What it really probably says about me is that I’m a weirdo about being on time. For pretty much everything. There’s  specific time we must leave the house for everywhere we’re scheduled to go, unless it’s just for fun. My family eventually learns these times after asking me when we have to leave a couple hundred times. They ask me because I’m the weirdo that makes up these times so I don’t walk in late. Last semester my English teacher had lots of fun with my anxiety about being on time by taunting me with statements like “if you don’t beat me up the stairs you’re getting a tardy.” Things like that? They almost make me pass out, until I realize you’re joking. Really. Then it’s hilarious.

So as I was sitting there thinking about all of this (when you have 15 minutes with nothing to do, you think about weird stuff. Come on, you do too. You can only refresh your facebook and twitter so many times before your phone goes dead or you realize no one wants to talk to you – whichever comes first), this lady comes in and confronts a man about where he is sitting. No, I’m not kidding. She walks up to him and asks him if he’s going to be sitting there from now on (I gather it’s where she’d been sitting) or if he’s going to switch again. She stated that she likes to pick a seat and sit there the whole semester and could he make up his mind so she can do so. She said all this with quite some attitude. I couldn’t believe she unveiled her issues like that right in the middle of Personality Theories. She knows we all just assessed her, right? And diagnosed her in our heads with a number of interesting disorders. It makes me laugh because some of you (or probably just my husband) remember my English class issue with the seat stealers who took over my seat (and the girl next to me’s) about a month into the semester, which in turn caused me to steal the seat next to them, which caused a semester long battle between the girl and guy who had been sitting on the other side of me for who would make it to class first and get to sit in my row. I was outraged at these annoying seat stealers! Why did they want my crappy seat in the back of the room that was the only easy to slide into open seat when I pranced in nearly late on the first day of the semester? Why would someone do this after a whole month of sitting on the other side of the room?

I never had the guts to tell them off. And didn’t get a chance to steal my seat back until it was too late… I’d already started to like them. And you can’t steal a seat from someone you know and like. So I enjoyed sitting with them for the rest of the semester, and came to know them by their names instead of as the seat stealers. What does this say about me? That I’m a huge chicken. The lady in my class? Not a chicken, and also not off to a good start at making friends. Maybe she doesn’t need any. I didn’t think I did either, but I’m glad I made some anyway.

I’m sure I’m going to have many more interesting revelations over the course of this class.