The adventure of the lively outhouse

Last week P. and I drove our van from Poway, CA, to Saint George, UT, to meet up with our high school age grandson, Cyrus.  He and his friend have been driving around the west camping for their spring break in the folks’ car.  We kept in touch by texting.

Cyrus’ dad, Todd, assured us that they would go with us anywhere for camping if we offered them shrimp scampi.  He advised us to stuff a wad of money into Cy’s pocket.  Later Todd told me he was kidding about the shrimp scampi.

Our first night, near Saint George, was dusty because we camped near a dirt road.  On a road, really.  In the morning a line of volunteer firemen lugged ropes and gear to practice vertical rescues.  We drove to Zion NP, hiked.  Cy booked 2 campsites near Virgin, UT.  

From Virgin we drove a couple miles on a narrow unpaved road.  Climbed to a vast meadow, a dirt road cut through.  Nearby fence and trees.  Distant cliffs of orange, pink, red rocks.  Evening.  Only a hundred meters across the meadow we turned off to a stone fire ring.  We weren’t far from a wire fence and a cheerful, blue, porta potty. 

I wanted to use the commode.  Headed for it.  Maybe a couple hundred feet.

The meadow was sparser than it looked at first.  Less grassy.  A few widely scattered cow pies.  Old ones, dry.  I soon reached the blue, plastic, portable commode.  I wondered if anyone ever cleaned it.  It looked bright and clean on the outside.

I heard flies buzzing as I reached for the door, pulling it open.  Oh yeah!  Thousands of flies.  Mark Twain called ‘em God’s darlings.  I hadn’t seen that many flies in one place since we camped in a Forest Service cabin years ago.

At first I stared in disbelief.  I didn’t want to see what I saw.

Someone left the seat up.  Usual disgusting sight.  I tried to imagine sitting on a toilet with hundreds of houseflies buzzing in and out of the hole.  Would they tickle my private parts?  What about the thousands more flies buzzing random orbits, trapped with me if I closed the door?  I hesitated.  Again, I tried to imagine me dropping my pants and sitting. 

I let go the door; it closed itself.  I had to leave.  I continued to hear the buzzing, albeit fainter, as I walked back to the fire circle.  Of course, I wanted to tell everyone about the phenomenon I witnessed.

At camp, Cyrus set up the camping table and we ate jambalaya and chicken soup.

Then the youths and I played several games of Bananagrams (R).  I did damned well until they got wise to me.

They told me how I’d been cheating.  Embarrassed, I called their attention to four slender young men walking in a file across the meadow to the outhouse with the thousand flies.  We watched expectantly.  This was a pregnant moment, likely never to be repeated in this life.

The four men chatted indistinctly as they approached the porta potty.  Three stood back, perhaps ten feet, as one approached the blue plastic door.  The one with the latch with the green crescent that states “open.”

I watched Cy’s friend’s face.  None of us paid any attention to our Bananagrams (R) game.  Our eyes locked onto the man as he reached for the latch handle on the commode.

We saw and heard the man slap the door shut like it was hot.  Then he and his companions filed back, marching the way they’d come.  

Gunther got excited and barked at them.  “Sorry!” I shouted.  We looked at the table.  Grinning.