I went to a friend’s house for dinner last night and between bites of bruschetta and ravioli, we compared autobiographies.

In January 2003, I was heading back to LA from Tempe, Arizona–the Hurricanes played Fiesta Bowl–and around Redlands or so I got a tickle like I had to pee. Okay, I thought, I’ll pull over when I really have to go.

Cut to: about 60 miles later and I URGENTLY have to pee. I’m afraid to breathe my bladder is aching so much. I have no idea where I am but I have to get off at the next exit. It is the most residential exit in the entirety of the 10 freeway; I am convinced of this. As I pass house after house, I’m seriously considering just knocking on someone’s door and pleading with them. Instead of that airtight plan, I keep going and end up on the Cal State L.A. campus, which would have been great if

a) I knew that campus at all,
b) it weren’t January when everything is closed.

I don’t know what to do. I can’t get back on the freeway. I’m tearing up when I notice that across the road from the desolate campus there’s a field with a dirt mountain AND A PORT-A-POTTY!!!!!! 😀

Why there is a port-a-potty standing by itself in a field I don’t know. I don’t care. I care that sweet relief is a few hundred feet away. I drive so fast to the port-a-potty that I almost knock it over. Only to get there and discover that it has chain and padlock around it.

So I ended up going behind the dirt mountain in full view of a suburban subdivision below.

I feel that this is, in some way, symbolic of my whole life.