I am lucky enough to live in a city that has decent public transportation coverage. We have a subway system and a network of buses that combined will take you pretty much anywhere you want to go. And because parking and gas are so expensive, and because people in this city really just do not know how to drive, I am a frequent rider of our public transportation system.
I’m also a little paranoid about germs after last year’s run-in with digestive system killing antibiotics which is how I find myself frequently patronizing the restroom to just wash my hands. Now, I ask you, what is so threatening about someone how comes into a restroom just to wash her hands?
I’ve critically examined myself in the mirror after an instance in which some woman gives me the hairy eyeball and rapidly exits the ladies’ room as I stand there soaping up my mitts. Let’s see: not wearing a N@MBLA t-shirt; haven’t peed myself and left wet foot prints on the floor in the way in; bathed recently; having a really great hair life. Yeah, I look basically presentable.
So why is it that most women seem to find inconceivable the idea that you could simply want to wash your hands before eating a meal (and often a meal that comes with free crusty bread and fabulous olive oil in which to dip said crusty bread)?
Is there some secret code that straight girls get taught that I missed out on ’cause I didn’t go to all those straight girl meetings in high school that tells them that women who come into the ladies’ room and just wash their hands are really doing the equivalent of the foot tap/wave under the stall sequence that seems to be so popular among gay men who are into public sex?
Or is it simply that we’re all so straight-jacketed by our perceptions of what we see as normal behavior that it has reached the point that any behavior we wouldn’t normally engage in seems threatening? I hope this isn’t the case. As the world gets more crowded we’re all going to have to learn to live a little better with everyone else’s foibles and twisted idea of what constitutes normal. Our only other choice is fascism and that really isn’t much of a choice at all.