The Fire Hose

  I believe that every parent has a memory about the first time their child did this or did that. I can remember the first time that I took my son out for lunch. My wife wanted to go to her office in downtown Portland to show off our three week old son. We drove down and parked near her office building and walked inside.
 It was a fun day; he meant my wife’s co-workers and got to go to his first McDonalds. Maybe that is why he likes that restaurant, so much; we can‘t go buy one without stopping for a burger and bit of playtime the indoor jungle gym.
   We sat in the dinning room of the restaurant having lunch when the familiar smell filled the air and it wasn't the burgers. So Jan took him into the restroom and found no changing area, no pull out table for our baby, nothing. She came back out and told me I will have to change him. We had decided not to be the kind of people that would chance our child in the middle of a restaurant. I still can’t stand the site of parents cleaning their baby’s bottom on the bench or even worse the table itself.
   I hauled him into the men's restroom and looked for the changing table. No table. The door to the only stall was locked.
  I asked the guy, “Sorry to bother you, but is there a changing table in the stall.”

  “No, Sorry,” He answered, not for the fact there was no changing table, but for what he was about unleash, it was another reminder of where I was. I set him up between the two sinks. While people walked in do their business and felt compelled to use the sinks.
  I heard, “Ah what a cute little baby.” Darrel was a cute baby but not when I was trying to get them out of what turned out to be the line of fire.
  I went about changing his diaper. I placed a new diaper under him and took the old one off and began to clean his soiled behind, that’s when it happened. He peed all over the mirror and sink. It was like a miniature fire hose that just wouldn’t stop. Felt like Lucy and at a cookie factory.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wp3m1vg06Q

   I looked around for something to clean the mess up and no towels. Someone thought it would save money to install an electric hand drier, but no place for parent to change their children. I had baby wipes but not enough; after all we were just coming into the city for a few hours.
  I thought of toilet paper but the guy that was in the stall seemed to be nesting. Between his smell, the smell of the dirty diaper, and the pee all over the counter I fled the bathroom, the McDonalds and the city. Not because of the pee, but because we lived in Vancouver at the time.
    So the next time you are in a public bathroom and see all the little water spots on the counter and the mirror I want you to think of the little fire hose.