J.P.

I love watching and observing people. I find human beings so fascinating because no two people are alike. Everyone has their own way of doing things and it’s interesting to watch others go about their business.

One trend that I’ve observed with my return to college has taken place in the men’s room. The young guys don’t use the urinals. Instead, they opt to go into a stall and do their thing there. I’ll walk into one of the college bathrooms and there’ll be a line of men waiting for the stalls but rarely will someone be using the assortment of urinals lining the wall.

Why is this?

I’m no Jaime Sommers but I have decent hearing, so I can hear the guys unzipping and peeing. I don’t hear their pants hit the floor like they’re getting ready to squat or anything (and I’m certainly not watching) so it’s obvious that these guys are choosing to go behind closed doors to do the same thing I used to do against a tree in the front lawn (until my father taught me to use the back lawn).

I guess I’ve never been pee shy so that’s why I don’t understand. Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t enjoy public bathrooms by any stretch of the imagination. They’re usually frighteningly dirty and as a clueless gay man I’m always afraid that I’m unintentionally giving out some secret signal to some not-so-clueless gay man who thinks I’m stomping, coughing or waving an intended advance when in fact all I want to do is pee. When I walk into a men’s room at a rest area or whatever I’m always sure not to cough, not to clear my throat and to keep my junk squarely aimed at it’s target. I’m not sharing. Not there.

This streak of modesty among my fellow male students has piqued my curiousity though. What happened in my generation that is causing us to teach our offspring that peeing in a urinal is bad? Is it low self esteem? Were we too free in the 80s and now the pendulum is swinging back to some weird Victorian age when it comes to bathroom habits?

I find it very interesting.

One of the hardest things about a quick weekend getaway, aside from the aforementioned snow incident, is getting back into the groove Monday morning. Especially when the thermometer says it’s -11 degrees fahrenheit. There is something very comforting about being under ten pounds of blankets and twelve pounds of cat in bed. It’s hard to get the old body moving when you can hear the roof creaking under the strain of the cold outside.

Nevertheless, I dragged myself out of bed and got my day started rather early this morning. I was so elated with the fact that I was out of bed before 8 a.m. that I started supper in the crockpot and studied all morning for my latest “math for dummies” exam. I didn’t completely lose my mind however, there’s still dirty laundry to be washed.

That’s tonight’s fun.

All things work out well I guess, for the studying paid off and I did well on the latest exam. My self-pacing for this course has paid off and all I have left is the final exam. I was given the practice final today by the instructor, I might tackle the real mccoy on Wednesday. I have two chances to do well with it. I intend on doing exceptionally well.

Earl always commends me on my dedication to my studies. I sometimes wonder where I’d be today if I had the same sort of enthusiasm for learning back on my first go around at college.

Tonight’s class was canceled so I’ve been working on my homework tonight, trying to get it done before the latest installment of “Heroes”. After supper Earl and I watched this morning’s “The View” via TiVo; I guess I never realized that HRG (Mr. Bennet) is Jack Coleman, the second gay Stephen from “Dynasty.” When I saw him without his “Heroes” trademark glasses, Earl and I exclaimed in unison that he’s pretty hot. I have a new appreciation for HRG man.

Nothing strikes terror in one’s heart after a glorious weekend with your lover in New York than these two heinous words: “Welcome Home.”

I’ve often thought that there is just one good thing about living where we live and that’s the fact that it’s easier to go somewhere else. After a beautiful weekend in The Big Apple, we drove up our road to our driveway to find that we couldn’t find it. There was a wall of about 4 1/2 feet of snow where the driveway should have been. The only way I knew the location of the driveway was because the two five-foot high posts I had installed earlier this year had their very tops showing. So I did the sensible thing.

I tried to drive through the snow bank.

With the Malibu.

What an idiot.

Naturally I got far enough into the driveway that I was able to bury the front of the car and trap us inside because we couldn’t open the doors. Earl briefly yelled at me for putting on the brake as I tried to make the plunge, which invoked my super powers enough to be able to force the door open. I trudged up the driveway, which had almost a foot of snow in it, got myself in the garage and grabbed a shovel and trudged back. I then started digging the car out. Earl and I took turns digging and rocking the car. I finally got out the snowblower and was able to clean out around the car a little bit. Earl then pushed while I rocked and then we rolled.

An hour or so later the driveway was clean long enough for it to start snowing hard again. I don’t care what it looks like in the morning.

Our area has been on the national news quite a bit because of the weather. One thing they keep talking about is the community spirit where neighbor is helping neighbor with a glow usually found around a fireplace and several glasses of brandy. Not here. The neighbors watched from their snug little houses as Earl and I huffed and puffed to get the car out of the road (which was unsurprisingly busy with big SUVs being driven by women with big hair) and into the driveway. I no longer care if I have to fire up the snowblower at 4 a.m. Tomorrow morning as they look out the window I’ll just wave back.