Toilet Talk

I simply must say I LOVE MY BATHROOM! …Whoa.  Let me explain. 

Have you ever thought about how wonderful your bathroom is?  How much has happened and how much you have discovered in that one little room?  Although small, bathrooms seem to hold the record for the most influential and versatile of rooms, hands down.  Allow me tell you a bit about my personal love for and history with the bathroom.

The bathroom started out as a play room, the highlight being bath time with cousins.   We would go on great sea voyages to far and distant lands, almost always sinking our ships on the way or being overtaken by pirates, yet somehow living to tell the great tales.  And remember all the bubble costumes???  So many possibilities!  We created everything from wigs like the ones grandma wore and bubble beards to Tarzan loincloths and Roman togas.   And I still like to play in the bathroom, particularly music.  There is nothing quite like the sound of a guitar in the bathroom.  The acoustics are amazing.  Give it a try.

(Caught red-handed playin' on the pot)

The bathroom was also, and still is, a place of comfort.  When we were upset as children my mom would rock us in the bathroom while letting the sound of the running water calm us down.  To this day that still remains one of my favorite and most soothing sounds.  Another favorite thing about the bathroom is the lock on the door.  Growing up in a large family, the bathroom was usually the only place one could go to get a few moments of peace.  Even in school, though the restrooms were multi-stalled, they were one of the quietest places in the entire building and often served as sanctuaries when there was someone seeking my attention that I didn’t want to give it to.

Most of all, my relationship with the bathroom has been one of discovery.  It is where I lost my first tooth, where I began to learn about my body and the bodies of others.  It is where I first discovered acne on my face and hair in new (and sometimes shocking) places.  It is where I first learned to shave my legs and where I discovered that a “period” was more than a form of punctuation.  It is while looking in the bathroom mirrors that I first admitted to myself my attraction to women, where I have been most self-critical, and where I have learned to love myself over and over again.  Don’t get me wrong, not all my experiences in this wondrous room have been pleasant.  Some have been downright painful.  But the bathroom has allowed me a space to get to know myself and to watch my personal transformation through the good, the bad and the ugly (like those huge dark hairs I keep finding growing out of the side of my face!  Yet I have even learned to love those in a strange way).

What does this have to do with LGBT issues, you ask??  Nothing.  And everything.  Self-discovery is everything, wherever it occurs.  So, since we are all on a wonderful and never-ending journey of self-discovery, send out some gratitude to your bathroom today for creating a space for you to be whoever you are at the moment, for never being critical when you find something in the mirror (or inside) that you are unhappy with, for allowing you a place to cry and laugh and learn.  Having a space like the bathroom is a wondrous thing indeed.  Maybe give it a little extra scrub next time you clean.