Swab those Decks

Boys, I tell ya…

I now have three toilet trained boys. I’ve dispensed with the potty in the living room. Anyone needing to answer the call of nature has to trot upstairs to the Real Toilet, do the necessary, and return downstairs again. I generally confirm the cleanliness of the hands in the downstairs sink, but apart from that, they’re autonomous. (You’ve heard of cleaners who don’t Do Windows? Well, I don’t Wipe Bums… They manage perfectly well.)

I’ve been at this job a few years now, and I still haven’t come up with a definitive answer to the Sit or Stand question.

They can sit comfortably. We have this little toilet ring, a little padded toilet seat that sits on top of the regular one, making a smaller and nicely secure spot for tiny bottoms. So getting on and staying on isn’t a problem.

If they sit on the seat, however, they often forget to angle their equipment down, and the pee gets under the toilet ring. Then, when the ring is lifted off, there’s a ring of urine along the front of the adult toilet seat, which I have to clean off before I can sit. Lovely.

If they stand, they tend to get distracted, or to step away before that last drop falls, and the rim of the bowl, or the floor in front, or in dramatic instances, the wall or even the toilet paper roll, get liberally sprinkled.

I dunno. No matter how we try this, I end up having to swab something.

I think back to a story of an uncle, now a highly respected forensic psychiatrist. When, at the age of four, he was scolded by his mother for getting pee all over the toilet, he looked up at her with indignation and asked,

“Have you ever tried to steer one of these things?”