I don’t like the city. Cities are cold and heartless.

I have never been mugged in a city but I have been embarrassed. The next worst thing to being mugged is to be embarrassed.

In my full and eventful life I have had a couple of city embarrassments that came very close to being fatal. (Whoever originated the word ‘embarrass’ certainly was a good wordsmith. Break it down to its two root words and you will note that it refers to that common condition of being caught with your pants down.)

The following spine tingling embarrassment could never have happened in the country.

Late one night I was driving through a city. The name of the city does not matter. It was just one of those generic, gray cities that have been planted across this land of ours to arbitrarily break up the wilderness. This was done so that we outdoor types would not become used to too much beauty and suffer a terminal case of B.B.B. otherwise known among savvy outdoor persons as “Bountiful Beauty Breakdown.”

Well, there I was, driving through a city late one dark night and suddenly was overwhelmed by a desperate and dire need to find a gas station and In case you’re wondering: I had plenty of gas!

“Woe is me oh Lord for I am in great and dire need!”

But at that point I was not being heard for there was no gas station with its accompanying rest room providentially provided. Oh, there were gas stations all right, lots of them, but they mocked me for they were all closed!

As my need became more dire it also became obvious that in that neck of the woods the sidewalks were rolled up as soon as a needy traveler was sighted.

As I drove along my need escalated from dire to demanding, to desperate and then from desperate to darned near disastrous.

You can wipe that smirk off your face because I know you have been there!

Being quite observant I noticed an abundance of large oak trees lining the street and Understanding that the good Lord put trees here for just such emergencies I pulled to the curb intending to… what the heck?

A police cruiser pulled in behind me with flashing blue lights! The officer, obviously thinking I was some dangerous felon, bellowed over his loudspeaker, “O.K. You in the car! Put your hands on top of your head and exit the vehicle!”

Hey, that’s a good trick. Have you ever tried to open your car door with your knees? It can’t be done!

Due to all the ruckus with the flashing blue lights and the officer bellowing on that infernal loud speaker the sidewalk along that nice quiet street soon contained roughly two dozen night robed, pajama’d and very curious citizens.

The technical name for a group of people as I have just described is known as a “hostile.”

It seems that this particular “hostile” had appeared out of nowhere! It was strange, all those people in their robes and ‘jammies, something out of “The Twilight Zone.”

I mean, really, not that many men in the world wear pajamas!

I tried to quietly explain my emergency to the officer but he insisted that I “speak louder sir!” I did. Everybody heard me!

The officer declared, “Well, we can’t have folks peeing in the street, we have ordinances against that!” Everybody heard him! One of the members of the ‘hostile’ hissed “Pervert!”

I’m sorry, all I wanted to do was pee!

The officer informed me with a cruel and fiendish grin on his face that there was an all night bus station about ten miles down the road. “You can use the restroom there.”

He should have added, “If you can make it!”

As I was getting into my car that ominous, anonymous voice called out once more from the sidewalk, ”PERVERT!”

Yes, It was a very hostile ‘hostile’!

Now if you were in the same situation and you needed help I would like to think that I would be sympathetic and that I would open my home to you and say something like, “I understand exactly how you feel, you come right in and use our facilities, there is a good fellow.” (Or maybe not.) But at least I would be sympathetic!

That heartless, hostile horde of pathetically parsiminous, pajama wearing twits, knowing my discomfort went back to their homes, with their nice rest rooms without offering this traveler one drop of sympathy. I say a pox on them!

The police officer escorted me to the bus station and then went forth to harass some other tinkler in the night.

As swiftly as possible, taking little baby steps due to the severity of my condition, I walked into the bus station, not a person in sight.

There, way on the other side of the concourse beckoning to me were the promised rest rooms. Finally relief was in sight!

Oh, oh, No urinals! Only pay toilets, and me with no change!

I couldn’t wait, desperate situations call for desperate measures.

There happened to be a space of about eighteen inches under the door of each stall. The floor being relatively clean I dropped to my knees and began crawling under the door.

Halfway into the stall something stopped me. A screw on the bottom hinge assembly was loose and it had snagged my jacket preventing any further progress either forward or back. I was trapped!

I was crouching there, a most uncomfortable position if you are wondering, endeavoring to free myself from my predicament when suddenly the place was filled with sound! Voices, lots of voices! Footsteps, lots of footsteps! A bus had arrived.

The restroom door banged open. One minute I was all by my lonesome and the next thing I knew I was surrounded! They were all trying to figure out what I was doing down there.

Someone asked, “Is he dead?” Somebody else ventured, “Nah, just drunk,” while someone else hissed, “Pervert!”

They all had quarters!

I don’t know who the guy was that invented toilets that flush automatically but one thing I can tell you, he was one sick individual!

I was laying there in uncomfortable misry minding my own business when it seemed that every toilet in the place flushed. Thank goodness my toilet was not plugged up. But the next one was!

Someone called a cop to take care of the “drunk” and It turned out to be the same officer of my previous embarrassment.

He walked in, took one look, and burst out laughing.

He really wasn’t a bad sort after all for he unhooked me and gave me a quarter.

Yes, he was after all a gentleman.

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