Warning: I am sorry for what you are about to read. I was sorry I lived it, at the time.
When my grandparents moved “back home” to the rural countryside after Granddaddy’s retirement, they began converting a bedroom to a bathroom in the house where they raised three children in the 1940s and 50s. I was around six when this particular event occurred. I couldn’t imagine a house without a bathroom (or a phone, but that comes later). My dad told stories of growing up without a bathroom: everyone took turns bathing in a tub by the heater in the living room, behind a blanket hung from a string. So, up to this point, there was an outhouse in use; I have no memory of that, but…
As I said, apologies.
No
I will not go
But you said you had to
I do I MEAN I DID
but not anymore
It’s not good to hold it
I’m not holding it
although
Granddaddy is,
he sets it there on the floor
white enamel pot
with a pretty red rim
it even has
a matching lid
We’ll go out, says Grandma
you just call us when you’re done,
so Granddaddy can take it outside
and dump it
No!
I don’t have to go!
We did this years ago
Daddy scowls,
stop crying
it’s not going to hurt you
just go
The pot sits waiting
No
I don’t even want to know
what happens after and
I’d rather bust with No. 2, so no
I
will
not
go

Chamber pot. Marion Doss. CC BY-SA
The perfectly beautiful, modern bathroom was soon finished at my grandparents’ home, although they occasionally referred to the toilet as “the pot” throughout the remainder of their years. I can’t recall seeing the chamber pot ever again. Thank heaven.
*******
The annual Slice of Life Story Challenge with Two Writing Teachers is underway, meaning that I am posting every day in the month of March. This marks my fifth consecutive year and I’m experimenting with an abecedarian approach: On Day 16, I am writing around a word beginning with letter p, which could really have gone in a number of directions here…
Special thanks to Kim Johnson for the invitation to write a vivid childhood memory this week on Ethical ELA, inspiring this poem.
