I shit you not: john of the John, part 1
The hot topic of discussion among freshmen who are still getting used to college life is what their favorite library on campus is. It’s kind of like politics in the US; technically, there’s more than two main parties in the running, but no one really thinks much about the others unless you actively seek them out. The two main contenders on campus are, of course, the SciLi and the Rock.
I’m personally a fan of the SciLi. She stands tall, mighty, her ugliness a beacon calling you to the middle of campus. She is visible from virtually anywhere. Her concrete holds within her a space for me to call home late at night before a major test. And while the Rock is no creature of beauty herself, she is still mighty and a wonderful study space. But today the question asked of the Rock is not of her worth as a library, but as a contender that draws to her roots; she is evaluated on the quality of her john, the first of three john of the John examinations.
My wonderful friend led me to her favorite john of the John D. Rockefeller library, tucked away in the fourth floor. Through the elevators I went, passing through the stacks of books I’m still a little too scared to touch. Typical STEM kid move.
The parts that are lit up are fine to walk through, but it’s so...eerily silent. The few time I’ve come here, I’ve lost track of time because I’m too busy being creeped out by the silence and the dark stacks. It’s energy efficient, of course, to not have every single aisle lit up, but this is an excellent place to get killed. It’s dark, it’s silent, and it’s easy to get lost. I’ve actually been to this bathroom before, and to be real, I ended up making a few laps around the floor trying to look for it because every hallway nearly looks the same.
Just look at that. Sometimes you make eye contact with the person working at the desk at the end of the bookshelves and you just have to look away, pretending that you’re looking for a book and that you didn’t find it. That’s another thing — my friends will ask to study here, but then they start walking towards the individual desks, and then someone eventually has to go to the bathroom, gets lost, gets even more lost trying to get back to the damn desk where you put your shit down (your shit as in stuff, not your literal shit; that shit’s reserved for the john.). After nearly making a full lap around the top floor, my friend led me to the bathroom.
The layout of this bathroom is kind of weird. The doors on the outside imply that it’s a multi-stall bathroom.
You walk in, and the first thing you notice is that it’s got two sets of paper towel dispensers and sinks, but only one stall. Is it a multi-stall bathroom or is it a single user bathroom? A single user bathroom is one you’d be able to lock and have to yourself, not worrying about whether or not you have an audience, but a multi-stall bathroom has simply that: multiple stalls. And while you will never be shitting next to someone here (unless you’re into some freaky shit, full offense), you risk someone walking in on you taking a shit in your not-so-private bathroom, an unintended audience forming around this spectacle you’re creating.
The second thing you notice is the lighting. It’s yellow. Why is it yellow? Yellow lighting is just gross. It’s functional but it looks dirty and it’s also not as bright as a white light. This is a bathroom, yes, and I suppose you don’t really need that much light, and if we’re trying to save energy, then it seems logical that it’s not nice lighting, but any other reason is invalid.
I walked into the actual stall where the gem of the library lay, the john of the John. I shit you not, it’s not very impressive. I’m again confused by the color inside the stall, edging a pink, which seems strange in a yellow-lit bathroom. It’s really off-white in an unappealing way. Not to mention that since there are no actual light bulbs inside the stall or right above it, you’re almost shitting in the dark. You shit there in the dark, your phone light illuminating your face.
At least it’s a really roomy stall length wise, which is good if you’re tall.
My friend then pointed towards a plate of metal hanging right by the door.
“This is the real treasure of this bathroom,” they said, pulling it down.
A damn “utility shelf” for the bathroom, where you can put your purse or something I guess. The spring is strong enough to snap back up, but not too strong that you can’t put your phone at the outer end of it and keep it open. But the shelf is not nearly strong enough to hold up my backpack, and so I sadly had to place my backpack on the floor of the bathroom. Disgusting.
It’s kind of cool that these exist though. Not particularly useful, especially if you’re a backpack kinda person, but interesting nonetheless. It would be fun if you could launch something from it, but it would just slam into the wall unless it was able to provide much more upwards acceleration.
I was delighted to find a tampon/pad dispenser, and upon seeing that the coin holes were covered up, I excitedly pushed the button below, hoping to see whether or not this bathroom would come in clutch.
It did not.
I’m not super impressed by this john in this John. It’s functional, and it’s got the trademark single-ply toilet paper, but it’s nothing special. It’s not cute. It’s got gross lighting, it’s just a worse version of what should just be a single user bathroom, and the additional parts to it that would make it decent aren’t even functional. Sorry, John D., but this john did me dirty, just like your oil companies did to the Earth.
Images via MJ Lee '22
