All I want when I go to use the toilet is a little bit of privacy.  I don’t get this at home because I’m accompanied by the little dog wherever I go.  Like Lyra’s pine marten, Pantalaimon, he is my daemon; I’m sure he feels that if he’s ever more than two metres from my ankles, his entire being will evaporate.  So when I go to the bathroom at home, he follows me, sits by my side, tries to jump on my lap, paws me, has a sniff while I wee.  If he gets a little too excited during my pre-walk call of nature, I have to pacify him with the tube from a used toilet roll, which he shreds in the time taken for me to have a wee (TMI).  Visitors to my house might think that I’m just lax in sorting out the recycling, but these things are wonderful to keep on hand for this purpose.

Anyway, if the lack of privacy in my own bathroom makes me weep, it is nothing compared the anxiety I face when using a public toilet, particularly the one at work.  It’s one of those hideous arrangements with five interlocking cubicles.  As if assembled from flatpack furniture, these fibreboard contraptions merely separate each toilet while leaving huge gaps at the bottoms and tops.  No sound-proofing, no privacy.

I hate people hearing me when I tinkle.  The sound is amplified so much in the echoey communal bathroom.  Then there’s the possibility of gaseous escapes, or even worse.  At work, I never take a comfort break unless there is a full complement of female colleagues in my office.  This reduces the risk of one of them being in the toilet at the same time as me.  But on a floor of many offices, staffed in the majority by women of the female persuasion, there is always a high risk of there being company whenever I make a call of nature.

Today was such an occasion, but it was company of the absolute worst kind: a mirror hog.  She was there as I entered the room.  Stood in front of the mirror, brushing her short, faux-blonde hair.  For fuck’s sake.  I’d just got into work after a waste of time hospital appointment and I hadn’t “been”.  My heart sank.  I knew that I needed more than just a wee.  

Jesus.  

I gave a cursory nod, rolling my eyes in thoughts, and brushed by her to my favourite cubicle.  My old favourite cubicle (number 1) is dead to me since the flush became unreliable and the cistern’s delayed refill time became too much to bear.  I now go for number 3 because I like to use the sink opposite it when I exit.   She was stood in front of number three.  I hated her.

I entered the cubicle, locked the door and followed my usual routine of wiping over the toilet seat.  This serves two purposes: it clears up the water splashes from the previous flush and also creates a cushion in the pan to reduce tinkle noise.  As I took my seat, she entered cubicle 4 – next to me!  I wanted to kill her.  She won the wee race – obviously she didn’t care as much about me re toilet seat hygiene – and was back at the sink as I left the cubicle to wash my hands.  I glanced across to where she was occupying my favourite sink.  She had placed a makeup bag on it and was applying some whatever it was to her face.  What the fuck?  What was wrong with this bloody woman?  Why couldn’t she do this before she got to work?  

My head was raging with images of bludgeonings as I left the ladies.  This exploded into a full-blown rant when I got back to my desk.

“What the fuck is wrong with women that they have to fanny around in front of the mirror in the bathroom instead of just going in there to use the fucking toilet?  If I had my way I’d remove all mirrors from public toilets, they just encourage stupid women to preen and get in the way of people who want to use the toilet and wash their hands!”

This is particularly true on the rare occasion when I find myself “out” of an evening.  You go to a bar, find yourself in the unfortunate position of having to use the facilities, then can’t get to wash your hands because of the three-deep queue of bloody women slapping on makeup.  More often than not, they dispose of tissues (usually the last of the toilet paper) in the sink, thus blocking them for people who want to use them for their intended purpose.

The mirrors in public toilets serve no logical function, they are surplus to the main requirements of having a wee and washing your hands afterwards.  They are often harshly lit and never show anybody at their best, exposing the tiniest of flaws that make the less confident amongst us despise ourselves even more than we have to.  Why do they even exist?  If mirrors do need to be available for those who can’t go a few hours without pandering to their vanity, they should be placed well away from where normal people just want to use a toilet.  Preferably in a stinking pit of venomous snakes.