A love letter to the public restroom.

A warning to all. As the title suggests, this post may get a little gross.

So today was predicted to be a gorgeous and sunny 85 degrees, and I decided the kids and I were going to take advantage of it and visit a splash pad in the neighborhood. 

I had previously scouted it out and had noted that it had one major failing, a lack of open public restrooms and garbage cans.  This allllmost stopped me from bothering, but I decided that was very "privileged American" of me, no? So I packed some extra plastic bags in case we had a dirty diaper or something while we were there.

We arrived, stroller completely filled with picnic food, swim gear, diaper bag, purse, etc. We looked prepared for a two week long asphalt camp out.

Of course, within the first 50 feet along our trek from the car Payne was struck with the need to pee.  As I mentally composed my nasty letter to the neighborhood planners, I told him to discreetly pee in the bushes.  Of course, at this precise moment in time, a little girl who had been happily playing at the splash pad around the corner was struck with irresistible wanderlust. Sorry Little Girl Wanderer's Mom.

We lunched, the kids were beside themselves with excitement.

I stripped them down next to a bush (not the pee bush) and quickly put them in their swim gear.  I was excited about several new solutions to the previous swim season's problems that I had come up with. 

G was shimmied into a Speedo brand swim diaper. I just put it over her regular diaper since I knew she wouldn't be submerged.  I tried the reusable swim diaper out because disposable swim diapers are the biggest crock of crap I have ever been swindled into purchasing (you see what I did there?).  If a kid poops in those things they do nearly nothing to hold it in.  I am saying this as a person who has scrubbed my kid's poop off of a friend's pool deck while strangers at a birthday party looked on, ok? I hate those things. So, as a new experiment G had on a normal diaper, speedo diaper, and swimsuit. 

Payne was also shimmied into a Speedo.  I bought him some Speedo jammers to wear under his trunks because the poor boy is knock kneed and gets his thighs chafed when he's in a wet swim suit for very long.  He is finally big enough to fit into the smallest speedos known to man, and I absolutely felt like I was being silently assessed as a potential sex offender when I purchased them.

After all of this prep, we're off!

They love it!

(Contrary to appearances in this photo, Payne has not recently lost any limbs)

I'm on cloud nine! Success!

And it only took this much stuff to get us here:

(snort)

The kids are happily playing and running back to me for bites of their lunch. I am so happy. I love getting them exercise and I love it when they're thrilled about something new.

Then Payne runs up and says he has to poop.

Dun dun dunnnnnnn.

There is nowhere to go. Nowhere. I JUST got them into everything and I packed so.much.stuff. We just can't go home yet!

Payne is hopping from foot to foot nervously.

My friends, please do not judge me.

I helped my kid poop in a zip lock bag.  I had him back up to a bush and held a bag....into which he pooped.

(passes hand dramatically over eyes)

You have no idea how hard I was praying that some unsuspecting soul merely in pursuit of a little light cardio didn't happen upon us in that moment.

Praise Baby Jesus they didn't.  They showed up about 60 seconds later, my poo bag of shame safely concealed under the stroller by that point.

With my blood pressure decidedly higher, I then tried to resume enjoying my children's enjoyment. They splashed. They ran. They played games together. Ahhh....

As we approached nap time, I decided to wrap things up.  I stripped G down, curious to see how the swim diaper had worked.  I was pleased to see she had dirtied her diaper and I had kept everything in. Fabulous! I plopped her down onto our only towel to change her and quickly realized she had pooped awhiiiiile ago.  Obviously I had no way of knowing through three layers of material on her butt.  Um yeah, her butt was so raw it was bleeding.  Why didn't she indicate that she was dirty? Why does she hate me? She will dramatically inform myself and our immediate neighbors that she could go for another bag of fruit snacks, but she can't spare a moment for "Hey Ma. I think all of the skin on my anus is gone.". Whyyyyyy?!

I'm still cleaning up Genevieve and fretting when Payne runs over and whines that he has to pee. Again! I snap at him to pee in the bush (I'm the enemy of all bushes today, man) and he happily strips off all of his shorts and starts on the task.  I glance over towards him to make sure he's alone and I see him PEEING DIRECTLY UPWARDS. JUST FOR FUN, YOU KNOW. ALL OVER HIS OWN PERSON. I scream, he redirects, completely naked now.  I yell at him to go rinse off. He runs completely naked through the splash pad. I desperately scan for the authorities who were surely called when someone in a nearby two story house glanced outside from their game room and saw a woman assisting a child in public defecation.  No authorities.

I scream for him to come back, finish dressing Genevieve, frantically throw his clothes onto him as a woman pushing twin babies strolls by.

I march my charges back to the car, dispose of the poo bag of shame in the only garbage can I can find, outside of a neighborhood pool that isn't open yet.  The can said recycling. The stuff inside didn't look like recycling. If it was I'M SO SORRY RECYCLING PROCESSING EMPLOYESS BUT I COULDN'T CARRY THE POO BAG OF SHAME ANYMORE.

I buckle Payne into his car seat and notice his nifty Speedo jammers have left him with some kind of allergic rash from navel to knee. We go home, I run in and smother Genevieve with Vaseline, wash my hands, examine Payne's rash (already fading, thank goodness), throw them both in their rooms and proclaim loudly that Mommy is "Done Done Done for the afternoon." They are like church mice. I can smell their fear.

Then I unload the car, throw all of the appropriate items into the wash and all of the picnic supplies into the sink.

Then I came here to tell all of you, while the horror was still fresh.

Next time I visit that effing splash pad everyone is getting a preparatory Imodium and I'm packing some OPAQUE garbage bags.

Finis.