You can tell my life has quieted down a bit when I have time to contemplate things like toilets. That and the fact that travel always open ideas for blogs because I am out in the world seeing things that I don't normally see. (Even though I see my toilet several times a day.)
I think this blog started with the purchase of our new toilet several months ago. Up to that point I really did not choose to think often and hard about toilets. In fact that is the soul reason I have a cleaning lady. I HATE TOILETS. Years and years of cleaning and gagging at the prospect of cleaning a toilet have resulted in a cleaning lady. I would love if she would come to my house once, (or twice) a day just to clean that nasty bowl of disgusting filth.
(We were once at a wedding where the persons sitting next to us lived in a Hippie Community and had no inside toilet. Seeing how they were living in the state of Maine we inquired how that worked during the often long and snowy winters. Their reply was," It's fine. We don't like to shit in our house." If you think about it any animal you know will not poop where it sleeps. And yet I have a toilet only steps away from my bed. TOTALLY GROSS! But also quite welcome in the middle of the night when I have to pee!)
Anyway . . . Once again, getting oldER is a problem at times when we have to "use the facilities". Have you noticed that most public toilets are built about 18 inches off the floor thus requiring good knees in order to sit? Go into a public rest room with several stalls. There will be ONE stall with a toilet built at a normal sitting height and the rest are just inches off the floor. When you sit at your dinning room or kitchen table do you sit nearly on the floor or are your chairs high enough that it does not require you to SQUAT? Are not the seats on trains, buses and planes a normal sitting height? When in waiting rooms are you required to squat in order to sit? So WHY are public toilets built so low to the ground ??????? And why is there only ONE "Handicapped" toilet sitting there at a normal height? I know I am not old enough to be considered handicapped but it is a problem getting my knees to bend so much in order to get down to the toilet seat. Especially after sitting in a cramped airplane seat for the past 4 hours. I feel guilty making a bee line for the one handicapped stall when there were all those wheel chair people on my plane. (But then it appears that along with being miraculously cured they also have incredible bladders that do not need to be emptied every 2 hours.)
I think we need to get some one thinking about changing the toilets in bathrooms to a NORMAL height and just make one or 2 stalls with teeny tiny toilets for the children and midgets who are traveling. There are far more adults than little people traveling and I think it would be a great service to all if toilets grew a few inches higher.
As to our new toilet . . . we bought it for Ger when he was recovering from the effects of chemo. He was so weak that the effort of sitting on such a low seat caused him serious problems. One day he got up the momentum to stand and wound up sailing across the room and into the opposite wall, smacking his head on the towel rack. (I'm sure this is not a common occurrence but it was a matter of get a new toilet or pad the wall of the bathroom.)
Once we purchased the new commode we realized how much nicer it was on our knees and backs. There have been no further incidents involving towel racks and I have decided that when in public I am heading to the handicapped stall.
I do tend to affect a limp just in case anyone is paying attention.
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