Take Jane's Challenge And Get A Month Free! Just Read This It Happened To Me

If you prove you read past The Wall, we will give you free access to everything for a whole, long month. Can you do it?!? (It's the first ever "We Pay YOU Wall," if you didn't get that already.)

First of all, I love Andy. He wrote an It Happened To Me that was so unique that I highlighted it out of more than 35 years of It Happened To Me when I was giving a speech last week. I also should say that I love Charlie, Andy's editor on this piece. Let me make one third point before I continue: I love doing a publication that is geared toward all genders. I know people say “all two genders??” and that's where I disagree and would love to have that conversation any time you want. And one more caveat: I don't mean to stereotype by suggesting that all things poop-related are more appealing to the male gender. But aren't they?

Having prefaced with all that, I have a challenge for you, and there is a prize at the end. If you, however you identify and whatever your feelings about reading about poop are, can get to the end of this post, past the moment that would usually include a paywall but this time features a special we-will-pay-you wall and prove that in the comments by saying something about the piece that happens after that point, we’ll give you a free one month subscription (or add that to your existing subscription). And think of it this way, if it's hard for you, I had to read this whole thing for free. More than once.

Happy Friday!

Xo Jane

Yes, I am an idiot. Is it that obvious?

It Happened To Me: I Did Something Unspeakable in a Public Swimming Pool

By Andy Finley

Everybody pees in the pool.

Well, maybe not as adults — maybe. But, definitely kids. Show me a kid under 10 years old in a pool, and I’ll show you a trailing cloud of greenish-yellow.

Certainly, I was no different. I remember how I justified it.

Why would I want to get out of the pool to use the bathroom? That’s, like, a million miles away and I’ll be missing out on the fun forever. Nope. Besides, there’s so much water here nobody will notice.

Such was the solid logic of childhood.

I was five years old, staying at a Holiday Inn with my family, near the Wisconsin Dells. I remember very little about that trip as a whole, but I recall with absolute clarity what happened during The Worst Pool Day Ever.

So, there I was in the three-foot section of the pool — I was too small for the deep end — when I felt it. Pressure. It was time.

This typically wasn’t a problem for my five-year-old brand of ethics, but, this situation fell outside those lines. This was … the other thing.

In An Internet First, We Will Pay You To Read Past This Wall. One-month free subscriptions to any of you who read past this point to the end of the story and prove it in the comments. Enjoy!

I really, really didn’t want to get out of that pool. When it came to pushing out a trophy, I was what you would call a Long Sitter. I would sit on that toilet until my legs went numb and I had a big red circle on my ass. I’d swing my legs and look at the patterns on the linoleum floor. Spend time watching a fly buzzing and crawling. Then buzzing and crawling some more. I’d make up songs. Count how many seconds it took for a line of sunshine to reach a speck of dirt on the wall.

Where's the fire? It's in my pants!

I don’t know what it was about sitting on the can that entranced me. It made my family crazy — especially when the house was getting remodeled and there was only one working bathroom.

Anyway, I’d designed the perfect crime. It would just be a simple matter of furtively pulling the back half of my swimsuit down far enough to send the train out of the tunnel. Then it would sink to the bottom and nobody would be the wiser.

What’s that saying about the best-laid plans?

I knew immediately that my scheme had gone horribly wrong. I felt something graze my back on its way to the surface. After I pulled up my swimsuit, I turned around and — holy crap — it was right there. A massive log screaming, “HEY EVERYBODY, THIS KID BAKED A BROWNIE!”

I did the first thing that came to mind: I pushed it down under the water with my hands. The damned thing floated right back to the top. I pushed it down again. It was stubborn. Taunting me.

Either I was too focused on the existential crisis unraveling in front of me to notice, or nobody else saw the human drama unfolding. There was no screaming, panicked rush out of the pool like it was full of piranhas. Not even a solitary “Ew!”

So, I took advantage of the moment, scooped it up, and climbed the stairs out of the pool. I needed someone to tell me how to solve this problem, and I knew just who to ask.

The kitten was obviously not happy. Probably because it knew what I had done at the pool.

Ten feet away, my parents lounged in the hot tub with other adults. It was a mystery to me why anyone would choose boiling themselves over doing cannonballs. Anyway, I approached like a supplicant, holding my offering before me in both hands. Arriving at the edge of the hot tub, I stood there, speechless, hoping my parents would save me.

Instead, they, and everyone else, just looked at me in horror. I stared at them. They stared right back. I didn’t know any of the other people in the hot tub. This seems to have fueled my parents’ brilliant strategy of pretending they didn’t know me. I was on my own.

I realized I had to find some way to get rid of my brown albatross. I needed to find a bathroom.

The problem was that I didn’t know where to go. I wasn’t familiar with this hotel. I certainly wasn’t going all the way up to our room. It felt as far away as Pluto. So, carrying my burden like a wounded bird, I trotted out of the pool area, past the main lobby, and down a hallway. My head swiveled left and right, desperately seeking a bathroom. No dice. Just a deuce in my hands.

This was 1976, when smoking was so common that there were literally “smoking” and “no smoking” sections on passenger jets. Having a no smoking section on an airplane is like having a no peeing section in a swimming pool. Anyway, it was easy to find public ashtrays, and one appeared to me like a beacon of salvation.

This type of ashtray was shaped like a bullet turned upside-down, so the flat part faced up. When the top part filled with ashes and butts, you could push a little button on the side. This opened two trap doors to drop everything into the container below.

Perfect.

I reached up and placed my sacrifice on the ashtray. Then I pushed the button to make my shame disappear.

But, with very few exceptions, turds are not cigarettes.

The giant, brown slug bent a little and stopped right where it was. I started pushing the button feverishly, willing the fudge pop to fall into the chamber. But it continued to mock me, holding the trap doors open and daring me to push it down myself.

It seems I always had a penchant for playing with disgusting brown things.

That was a bridge too far. So, I ran back to the pool.

I jumped in, rinsed my hands off in the water, and it was back to our regularly scheduled program.

Approximately five seconds later, my parents decided pool time was over.

My father called out. “Andy! Let’s go!”

“Aw, come on! Already?”

“Yeah. Let’s get the hell out of here. Robby! You too! We’re going.”

Fortunately, they didn’t say a word about our dark, stinky secret in front of my older brother. He would have told that story to everyone in earshot, every day, for the rest of his life. In fact, they didn’t say a word about it to me at all. Ever.

Once we got back to the room, Mom told me to take a bath.

“But I was just in the pool.”

“You’ve got to be kidding. Get in the tub. And use soap!”

I sighed the sigh of any long-suffering kid, and took the bath. When it was over, the water took my sin down the drain with it.

That was a long time ago. I’ve thought quite a lot about the poor employee who came upon that brown nightmare. So, if you were working at a Wisconsin Dells Holiday Inn back in 1976, and were told to clean a giant turd out of a hallway ashtray: I am so, so sorry.