Resourceful, That's What

People have to go to the bathroom when they are at races. I've been to races where the whole starting area was completely surrounded by port-o-potties, lined up like stalwart sentinels, with people in turn lined up like anxious ducklings waiting for the red to flip to green and the former occupant to exit the smelly chamber. If anyone ever counted how many rolls of toilet paper racers go through, there might be enough to stock an entire elementary school for a whole year. Or two.

The point is, there is bathroom-going going on, and everyone knows it and everyone does it.

At our high school cross country meets my six varsity girls and I would go on our warm up run with one quest--find the hidden port-o-potty no other team was using. Every course had one, but few teams were ever motivated enough to find it and just stood in the ginormous line anyway. Not the Spartan Buggins. We would do laps around the course, weaving through pine trees and taking dirt paths until we found the random John lurking as back up and all seven of us would be in and out before the main port-o-potty line had even progressed one inch.

My senior year at Arapahoe we were not the only ones to find the random port-o-potty. In fact, based on our experience there, quite a few bladder bursters had been there before us.

We jogged up to it, arriving at the same time a boy in a red jersey and short blue runner shorts came sprinting to the door from the other direction. He got there first and pulled on the handle of the door, only to find it locked. We formed ourselves into a line as he leaned against the grimy corner of the biffy, panting to catch his breath and shifting his weight from one foot to the other. You know, "The Potty Dance." He really had to go and we could tell.

We talked among ourselves and hopped up and down to keep our muscles loose. We could see little beads of sweat forming at the boys hairline as his face became more and more troubled with each minute that passed. I hoped--more for his sake than mine--that whoever was in the port-o-potty would come out soon. That boy was about to burst.

"That poor boy!" Lynnea whispered it under her breath, swinging her braid over her shoulder to peek at him. "Haha... he really has to go."

"Happens," Jordan said, her eyes squinting with laughter. "He must have just finished running."

I looked over at the boy again just as the biffy door opened and a old man with a Leadville 100 hat came out. He was buckling his belt and smiled at us, but not before the desperate boy dashed into the door and didn't even bother to turn the handle so the red "occupied" side showed.

The man turned around and chuckled, looking back at us. "I was going to tell him, but I guess he didn't need to know."

We shifted glances then looked back at the man, our eyebrows raised.

"Well, it's all out of toilet paper in there!" He shook his head and finished tucking his shirt in then walked away, still chuckling.

"Uh-oh," I laughed before looking at my girls. "I guess that's ok. Maybe we can find some leaves or something?" We were runners. We didn't need too much to make it through.

We stayed in front of the port-o-potty weighing the lack of toilet paper as a lesser loss than waiting thirty minutes in line at the other place. We continued talking and laughing, waiting for the boy to come out again. He took a long time.

The door swung open and banged against the outside wall of the bathroom. He was using the structure to balance himself as he was bent over,for some reason, putting his shoe on.

"Whoa," I whispered it to my teammates. "He must have been working really hard in there!"

Lynnea turned to the boy, twisting her braid. "Was there anymore toilet paper in there?"

The boy slammed his foot on the ground to push his shoe over his heel and looked up. He smiled and laughed then straightened up. "No. But it's ok. I've got more black socks."

And he ran off, leaving us at the hidden port-o-potty, drowning in our hysteric laughter as we watched his socked and sockless feet alternate into the distance.