Shitting in the Stacks Vol 2

Over the past number of months, I have received a vast amount of correspondence from readers asking for a follow-up to my piece, "Shitting in the Stacks." It was not until last night, however; an hour and a half before my GIS class final, that I had a second personal experience from which to draw.

Shitting in the Stacks Vol. 2

With rasters, vectors, and interpolation crowding my weary head, I was testing the law of diminishing returns with respect to fact-retention in the last couple of hours prior to this final test. The weather was bitter cold; 1 degree above zero with a biting wind, and without warning, a sudden, butt-crippling urge to take a shit was upon me. Without hesitation, I headed for Wilson Library (built 1961).

I glided through the level-one turnstile and jogged left a step or two into a familiar torchere-lit hall to the men's room. It was an hour prior to the last slot on the last finals day of the semester. Nobody was around. Banks upon banks of empty, iron-wrought stalls lined the back room of the two-room facility. In each was a marvelous, ivory-white porcelin stool that were made from a Time of Craft, with brass plungers and a curious, vaguely odd shape that brought to mind notions of antiquity, not unlike those old bathtubs with feet. I breathed a sigh of anticipation that echoed off multitudinous surfaces and entered the third one from the left. It crammed full of shit and toilet paper, so I exited and went to the stall on the far right.

Sitting down, I noticed fancy light fixtures above that sent beams of golden incandescence down to reflect off the water's surface, then back up between my thighs to dance upon the intricate, relief-filled walls and ceiling. Whatever turds emerged I do not remember. They must have descended quietly in turn, almost reverently, to the bottom of the bowl. Whatever smell there may have been I also cannot recall, for I was taken with the dusty smell of tomes that worked decades to find its way through cracks and vents. My task was rendered academic with thoughts of scholars that have filled incalculable number of bowls preceding me.

Finishing, I left to find a quiet place to get my mind ready before the test.