To celebrate blind awareness month, I thought I’d share an excerpt from a short story I wrote, “Restrooms Aren’t Restful.” Next to not seeing babies or pictures, my greatest challenge of being blind is visiting public restrooms. Enjoy taking a funny peek into my world without vision.
Restrooms Aren’t Restful
After concentrating to navigate the open maze entry, attempting to ignore noises of other visitors, I could continue my assessment. “Okay ears…round two.” How large is this room? What do you hear? Are the stalls next to each other? How many stalls can fit in the size of this room? Inching closer to the sound of a flush, I hoped and prayed the door didn’t swing out, and that I was far enough back to keep from getting smacked.
My daughter usually is here to guide me directly into the stall to avoid this chaos. When strangers assist, they inevitably take me to the handicapped one……guess they consider blindness a handicap. Let’s see, they can take me to a small stall where I push open a door, trail it with my hands as it swings open, landing my feet in front of a pearly porcelain. Or, they can pull open an extra wide door, without my knowing if I’ve entered or not. Reminds me of playing “Pin the tail on the donkey” and them forgetting to tell you where the donkey is, except I have to find the door to shut before playing, “Let’s explore more.” Now, where is that toilet?
Family members being present provides the advantage of letting me know if it’s safe or not to sit. Helps avoid falling in, sitting in yuck, or plopping on a closed lid. Once safety issues aren’t a concern and your business is done, it’s time for arm exercises. Yes, arm exercises. Right arm to the right, lower, higher, forward, repeat. What? No toilet paper. Try the left arm…same exercise. What? No results still? Ouch! Might not have found toilet paper yet, but I sure found a trash dispenser. Okay….concentrate…..back to arm exercises. You’re finger will be alright. Stretch higher. Move backwards instead of forwards this time. Hmmmm. Sweep the floor on both sides and check the tank. No, really. how about trying lower on the walls. Tadah! Victory. Don’t get too excited – there’s no toilet paper. Just kidding, but that happens a lot too if you don’t remember to check before taking your seat.
Time to flush, then you can leave. Flushing is the smallest scavenger hunt of all. Start on the front right then move to the side. If you have no luck, check out the left, but you might have to push in the middle of the tank. In a hospital, look high. In larger stores look for an extended handle out to the side. Those are nice because you can use your foot; great for germophobes. If all else fails, stand up – you’re more than likely visiting an automatic flush.
“I’m glad this door knob turns easy. So many locks are tricky, or worse, broken. it’s time to go hunting again, this time for a sink, soap, and towels.” I know I heard water running during my arm exercises so the sinks must be to my right. Yea! No one is out here so I can avoid embarrassment. Well now, here is a sink, but how in the world do you turn the water on? I can’t find any handles anywhere. Right then a woman entered seeing my look of confusion and my cane leaning on the counter beside me.
She said, “Oh, those are motion-censored. Took me a long time to figure that one out myself.”
After waving my hands underneath the faucet, they were ready for some soap. Wondering if it would be motion-sensored as well, I was grateful to discover it wasn’t. Its reach and height made it easy-to-find. Score one-to-one. Now, time for drying. Ah, paper towels directly to my right….easy to pull too. Hope the trash can is as easy. I’m really glad this restroom doesn’t have those blow dryers that are as loud as freight trains. They make it so difficult to hear other clues. And people wonder why I carry wipes in coat pockets and keep hand sanitizer in the car.
I pray my patient husband hasn’t left yet, or reported me missing.
Your thoughts or comments are welcome.
© 2015, Jena Fellers. All rights reserved.
Hi Amy. Thanks for chiming in. I’ve suffered the lid down catastrophe numerous times – more so when i had low vision like yours, than now. I love it when a family member informs me of the lid situation, the cleanliness, and uses my cane to tap the front of the stool then the paper dispensor. Helps a great deal. Definitely a new adventure every time.
So relatable! Public and unfamiliar bathrooms are one of my top ten difficult places to navigate. I have also gone with the lid down, not knowing! the problem is you don’t know what you’re feeling for. it really is an adventure!