Nature Calling

My friend Nat has this tattoo on his ribs. It has the word ‘comfort zone’, surrounded by a circle and outside the circle, further along his skin is the word ‘dreams’. It’s a concept most people are familiar with: our dreams lay outside our comfort zone. This year has been critical for me in understanding the concept of my comfort zone and why the heck I would ever want to get outside of it.

Prior to this year, I would have described things outside of my comfort zone as boring stuff like putting my hand up first in class or staying at a mate’s place without an overnight bag. Being outside my comfort zone makes me feel specific things I don’t want to feel and I’ve discovered there are a whole range of those things I hadn’t tapped in to. My usual uncomfortable experience might make me feel a little vulnerable or embarrassed and the reward would be equally small where I would feel a little proud or brave. But there are other feelings outside that comfort zone that I was happily skipping over like anger, shame, humiliation, fear, doubt, rejection. The thing is, to feel these, I’d need to do things I very much didn’t want to do, thanks a lot.

Don’t get me wrong. Putting my hand up first brought on some sort of internal agony that was difficult to sit with, but I did it. I did it quite a bit and I grew. And then I started doing things that made me even more uncomfortable. Now, if you have read my previous posts, you will have heard about my adventures with The Outside. This experience was not graceful. I did not just look at the mountains, feel magical and suddenly become bewitched. Yes, that was one facet of it, but there were a thousand uncomfortable moments in between which worked like a crowbar, cracking open bigger places inside me that made me feel more capable and whole and strong and vast. Those lovely feelings mentioned might be the end result, but to get there, first I had to feel some fear, embarrassment, humiliation and shame. What would make me feel all those things?

As previously mentioned on the blog, I do not have a great history of bladders and outside. The idea of squatting to wee in the outdoors is something so unnatural to me that I would shudder at the thought of it. It’s a position of vulnerability, that cannot be easily stopped or recovered from. What if you are happened upon mid whizz? What if someone somewhere is looking at my bits as I piddle? How does one have a polite conversation when one is mid bodily function? I would have to find out.

In Canada, I camped in my boyfriend’s awesome van. This meant no access to toilet facilities so if I needed the loo we would have to coordinate toilet stops in order to use one. This was fine if I needed to go in the morning or at night before we had settled down to bed. But what, my friends, what if I needed to wee at night where no loo was available? Thus begins our adventure.

Liana of @findingfemme wears flannel shirt, jeans and Timberland boots in outdoor style outfit

Note: sitting on a log, not recreating a bush wee.

The first time this occurred I woke up feeling super uncomfortable. It was over a week into the trip and I had thus far managed to avoid a midnight incident. We were parked in a group with other van-lifers, our car closest to the bushes and water, thankfully. The other side was a few hundred meters of rocky ground and other groups of campers for all to see. I am not a boy though. I cannot gracefully turn my back to a group, pull out my noodle, point and pee. For a lady to liquidate, she must first remove all garments that may be directly beneath her business as gravity would dictate that anything below the exit point of would result in it getting wet. She should also shorten the distance between the exit point and the point of impact as physics would dictate that a far distance will result in both less accuracy phenomenon known as splashback. This would increase the possibility of one unintentionally getting wee on oneself. Not ideal. Back to me. I was awake. I was uncomfortable. I started doing a body scan to identify what might result in my comfort and BOOM. My mind arrived on my bladder and surer than anything I knew, I needed to wee.

Now, I as much as I love my man, squatting and taking the first outdoor whizz in many many years was not an indignity I wanted to bond over. So, I started wriggling out from under his arm. After several painfully slow movements, separated from him in the bed, I waited until I was satisfied I had not caused him to stir. The first hurdle achieved I turned my mind to how to overcome the next. He was laying between me and the door, so I had two options. Either climb over him and wake him up or exit through the front door. I chose the front door, sneakily collecting my parka as I did so. Could I take toilet paper? What would I do with it? I couldn’t just leave out it out there! I wasn’t going to dig a hole with my hands and bury it in the bushes! No. I would have to shake. The next hurdle was my nudity (aside from my knickers) so put my parka on, zipped it up so I was covered and slipped on my man’s crocs. Then, as silently as a cat I slipped out the door, stalked to the back of the van and looked out at everything lit up by the moon. I was faced with the crippling knowledge that someone, somewhere could very easily be looking out at me as I stood at the back of the van. I decided to face my fears, whipped up my parka, squatted and wee’d, my big eyes like an owl’s, glancing about looking for any sign of the dreaded observer. Then as quickly as I could I shook my toosh, snuck back into the car, unsuspected, feeling incredibly proud of myself. As it turned out, this was the pee-nultimate adventure. I still had to face the most terrifying pee incident of the trip. I was fortunate that this one prepared me.

Some days later we were camped at the same spot with a group of friends, but this time we had learned of a mystical porta-loo, a hundred meters away on the other side of the big uneven dirt area. The group was collectively parked by the bushes and water, but our van was parked on the inner side, closest to the big open expanse of dirt and other camp groups. I woke up at midnight in desperate need of a wee. This time, there was someone awake next to our car. At fir,st they were chatting with other people so I waited under the blankets all snug for the late night conversations to end. He wandered back to his van. This is it, I thought, he’s going to bed and then I’ll wait a minute and I’ll walk over to the loo. I sat up and then I heard more noises. The guy gets out a bucket and begins filling it with water. I listened in agony for around ten minutes as he slowly and thoroughly washed every single dish in his possession right next to our van. When this ridiculous ritual ended he then poured. the. water. out. At this point, my naked self nearly leapt out of the car and smote him with a righteous amazonian strength. Instead, I channelled my frustration into extracting myself from the bed and sliding into the front seat with my parka. I then discovered there were no shoes for me to access. I wouldn’t be able to walk across the uneven, rocky, broken-glass ground for 100 meters to the porta-loo without an extra twenty minutes to navigate the terrain. I was practically sweating bullets at this point. I was going to have to squat. But we weren’t parked in an inconspicuous area. We were in full view of all the other campers spots.

I was about to open the door when old mate dish washing guy decides to come back and slowly hang and fold what seems to be every item of clothing he owned. He then took out his toothbrush and did a first class dental hygiene level brush which took minutes. He rinsed his mouth out. Then he went off and a did a wee in the bushes. Of all the campers we had to be parked next to, of course, we were parked next to the one with impeccable personal hygiene. Then finally, ten years and three days after he started getting ready to go to bed (would have been quicker if he wasn’t treating his van like he was working at five star hotel and was his own personal room service) he got into his van. There was nothing for it. I needed to pee so bad I thought my kidney’s were going to rupture and kill me. I slipped barefoot out of the car, walked every ouchie step to the front of the van, looked out at the exposed view in front of me, prayed to all the gods I could think of and squatted. I glanced around in panic as I went looking for any sign of movement to indicate my business was being supervised. My heart pounded. I dared not to breath. Then from my side, the sound of old mate dish washy, clothes hangy, toothy brushy opening the door to his van. Now friends, let me reassure you that waiting a damn hour for him to be finished his personal grooming routine my bladder was fuller than metro train at peak hour. I was not in for a short wee. I was trapped in this vulnerable position until such time as my bladder decided it was done. And it was not done. I had enough wee to be the foundation for a myth about the forming of a new river, to be passed down from generation to generation like, see that there river? The mountain from which it flows is called The Squatting Woman. I stared, wide eyed at the small gap in his door where I could see he wasn’t looking, just absent-mindedly deciding if he would indeed open the door. As the rivers of relief gushed from me I resolved myself to what was about to be the most awkward interaction of my entire life. What does one say to someone who has happened upon them weeing. Would ‘hello’ be weird? ‘Good evening’ seems to formal. Good gracious, will this wee never end. Then, without looking, he slid the door back closed. Perhaps, oh god, perhaps he opened it, heard the incredibly loud sound of my wee, and closed the door. I scanned back around the campsite with my eyes. No other movement. My ears strained to hear and predict his next actions inside his van. After what seemed like a comically long time, my bladder decided it’s epic Shakespearean monologue was finished. My senses still Spiderman sharp, I capped off the endeavour with a humiliating toosh shake, covered myself back up and slipped back into the car to a very awake and curious boyfriend, who, to my relief, was as proud of me as I was.