I have a strange relationship with public washrooms, that is, I both need and fear them. How I fear them, let me count the ways…

1. When I use the bigger stalls for the disabled, I fear a disabled person may be lining up outside. So I always do my business a little faster in these stalls.

2. There’s always a moment of suspense when I push the stall door open. I half expect a ghost kid to be sitting on the toilet or a human head stuffed in the toilet (It’s happened to me once when I opened the door and a little boy identical to the one from The Grudge, looked up at me from the toilet. I was half petrified, half thinking, I knew it! But his mom was in the stall next to us, so it was a little anti-climatic). 

3. This one is really strange, but i guess I’ve already established my insanity…. so… i also fear when using the toilet a hand may reach out from it and grab me. yah, i know… i am crazy.

4. If there are windows or vents in the washroom, I think someone’s looking at me from them.

5. I fear running out of toilet paper, walking into what other people have left behind, forgetting to lock the door and getting walked in on… 

6. Last but not least, I fear the auto flush flushing on me when I am still on toilet. 

There it is, my fears of the public washrooms. I am, otherwise a relatively sane person.