How to fail Interior Design
I thought I'd done enough damage for the night and was about to kick off. It had been a full evening: A half-assed, reactionary blog; a half-dozen knee-jerk blog responses; a similar amount of similarly poor comments on other blogs. Yep, a pretty full night.
But bed wasn't in the cards, Fate had other plans.
I'm house-sitting with Shannon while her parents are away. They have a nice house--lots of big bookshelves with lots of old books and lots of signatured baseball memorabilia. It's cozy in a don't-touch-anything kind of way. Cozy in the middle, the stuff to be left alone resides on the periphery. So it's a nice, relaxing place as long as you keep to the thoroughfares.
For all it's niceties and creature comforts, which are legion, going to the bathroom downstairs is an exercise in sheer terror.
There is a mirror. The mirror is the entire length of the wall--at least 7 feet. It's probably 5 feet high. Huge.
I'd have to get out a tape measure, but it must have roughly the same surface area as the whole of the walking space. It's a tiny bathroom with a big, big mirror. A mirror that size is obviously compensating for something--especially when it's in the auxiliary downstairs half-bathroom.
The problem, besides being an affront to God, is that it looks directly across onto the toilet.
It is always there, staring at you, hoarding secrets.
From where I sit I can see most of my torso and head. If it wasn't an involuntary reflex, I'd have given up bowel movements altogether.
The feeling is like staring down the absurdity of the entire human paradigm--looking it right in the face. The face that stares back is screwed up in some indescribable fashion teetering between ecstasy and revulsion. The two of you just sit there mimicking each other until you're done.
What are you going to do, stare down at your junk? Look around the room? Tell me, have you ever tried to avoid looking in a 7'x5' mirror when you were 18 inches from its gleaming surface?
It is total and complete vulnerability. I don't like it one bit.
posted by Luke @ 12:52 AM
3 comments
3 Comments:
Before I finally got an office at school, I worked in the 'HUB' at CMC. There were lots of TVs and usually lots of people around (not to mention the *unusually* attractive student female contingent), so sometimes it was hard to get work done, but the nearby food was great and it was a pretty nice space.
Except for the bathroom.
For one, peeing on the rim of the toilets was a sport rather than an accident. It happened so much every day that if you sat down -- while the toilet appeared dry -- the dried layers of urine would reconstitute on the back of your legs. Golden showers for everyone!
More urgently, the urinals were set perpincicular to the -- you guessed it -- 5'x7' giant mirror that was just four or five feet away. That way, every time the bathroom was occupied by more than one person, one would inevitably finish first, go to wash their hands, and would be treated to site of the other person finishing their evacuation. Very troubling. On more than one occasion, I had to suppress the urge to yell, "Hey, check out my penis!" when someone was standing at the sinks.
--Mike Sheffler
I don't understand it frankly, then again I'm not a big fan of mirrors in general.
How many guys do you know who like the sight of their own junk?
How many PEOPLE do you know who like to see their face all contorted and screwed up?
Those I can think of are of questionable character.
It's troubling, yes.
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