It was Wednesday. There was hair, not mine, not my roommate’s, and grime. There was styling product and extra sensitive shaving cream, facial lotion and boogers (mine), yellowed contact solution and a midnight gummy crud all congealing and floating in four inches of stagnant, standing water. And toothpaste (used) from my mouth. All of this, all of these pollutants, swirling clockwise, was staring up at me from my bathroom sink.
I had tried to fix the clog myself. I thought, putting on my plumber’s cap, that if a plunger worked on a toilet then it would undoubtedly fix my sink. I remembered once, back in crayfish country (Indiana), that I had unloaded a stoppage in my mother’s kitchen sink using a plunger. I, proud of my work, grandly informed my mum of my feat, worthy of any son of a shop steward for the local carpenter’s union 1124. She hadn’t thanked me; only chided me for using a utensil that unclogged and backwashed shit in the room where we prepared food. Now, in my own apartment, in my bathroom, the same plan hadn’t worked.
If I had been a heart surgeon, I would have lost the patient.What was once a slow draining clog had turned into a full-on roadblock. At first, I ignored it. Washed my hands, brushed my teeth, and shaved all in the shower. My roommate had gone out of town for the week, and even alone, the pure idiocy of this embarrassed me.Phase two found me keeping a drinking glass next to the sink, so when I had finished my primping and hygienic rituals, I could bail out my sink leaving only a few inches of water. More crud, more toothpaste, and more…occasionally, if the drain was feeling moody I guess, it would burp up more midnight tar. It was leaving me a present.
On Thursday, I was diagnosed with strep throat, and for a fleeting moment I wanted to blame the sink. Bacteria from the drain, from the cup, from the midnight tar, had found its way into my throat and inflamed my tonsils.
It was on Saturday that I broke.I was alone and lonely. Being sick and contagious makes you realize what kind of friend you really are. Having this bad habit of never contacting or keeping in touch with my friends, I knew they couldn’t drop everything to keep me company. I wouldn’t expect that of them. Not that the offer would have been enticing had I kept up on my correspondence.
“Hey, why don’t you come hang out with my highly contagious ass just to make me feel better about myself?”
And the one person I knew would take care of me, my roommate, was out of town on familial obligations.Exhausted, dizzy, doped-up, forlorn and frenetic, I stared at this mess, at my murky reflection in the standing water, and cried.Maybe because of the sink, maybe because of the grime, maybe because of the past. At that moment, though, I couldn’t be sure. I am not normally this emotional, but, having spent the last of my money until next payday on doctor’s visits, penicillin, and lime sherbet, I had forgotten to budget for my little secret; my crazy-happy pills.Truth be told, I hadn’t taken my Zoloft for a week, and despite the fact that I could finally masturbate again, I had been painfully and irrevocably going crazy.Staring, through tear stained eyes, feeling lonesome and sick, I said aloud:
“This clog is me.”
***
Being this harried, overwrought even, is not as easily said as done. It requires a strange grace and presence that I don’t normally attain. Ahead of me, in a five day stretch, I had a closing weekend of a show, tedious rehearsals with a fledgling theatre troupe, a new audition and callback in a different city, a pre-scheduled and long overdue phone call/fight with my mother, a quasi-potential-not really a date (hangout and stare at a TV), a picnic with my returning roommate, and a final farewell with an old friend.This is not a list of incidentals. These tasks were scheduled tightly, allotted time limits and typed into an electronic calendar.Not that these task would be difficult, but with streptococci, penicillin, exhaustion and a lack of happy pills all thrown in, everything became much more daunting.
Everyone phone call I made, or didn’t make, every rehearsal I was late for, or every pill I swallowed was like adding another spigot full of water into my basin. I didn’t want to look underneath the surface of this lake. Then I would see it, the source of my problem. Not my schedule, not my sickness- but me. It would all keep adding up and if I didn’t clear out my hairball, I could only choose to bail myself out slowly. Eventually I would be dry, but nothing would be fixed.
But, much like my sink, I didn’t know how else to solve the problem. The plunger didn’t work. Shoving an old toothbrush down the drainpipe didn’t work. Praying didn’t work. Kicking the sink basin didn’t work. So I began bailing.
I cancelled my quasi-pseudo date, it wasn’t that important to me, and why infect someone I didn’t feel close to? I was sick, but not heartless. As I had being doing for a while, the relegation of my love life to the back seat was an easy sacrifice and un-terrifying. I called my mother, but spoke to her under the guise that I only had a few minutes to spare before I was to be whisked off to my final, closing night show; smoothing things out for the time being. I swallowed my antibiotics and trudged through my rehearsals, trekked out to the suburbs for an audition (which I landed, strangely enough), but most of all, I slept. Nothing cures loneliness like unconsciousness. Between naps and drugs I watched television and ate massive amounts of ice cream.
Occasionally, I would venture into my bathroom and bail out the stagnation that floated below, only for more to burp up later. At times, I swore I heard it. A gurgle, a rumble, and then the sound of reverse peristalsis would float into the living room and shadow over my Comedy Central.
Then, the first break.
My roommate arrived back and reminded me that we had scheduled a picnic. What I thought would be an obligation turned quickly into the most pleasant of activities. Finally a real person was speaking with me. Not begrudgingly, not out of obligation, but because she was happy to see me. And I, most certainly, was happy to see her. I tried not to show her the sink, but the plan was futile. After a four hour train ride the only thing she would need, was a bathroom. She looked at it and gave it a marginal look. This clog was not my roommate. She could not share in my pain, so I figured it best not to let her know how it had affected me. After our picnic, we laid around in the first summer sun, burning our skin and just existing; floating. I pictured her and I like two pieces of midnight tar swirling counter-clockwise, not afraid of the dark because we knew we weren’t going anywhere. We were still, but not stuck.
***
For the entirety of this stillness, I was on the verge of tears, although I suspect she didn’t notice. Not that I was sad, not that I was morose, but as if I was pressure. Like a sweltering force or ball of energy. A certain kind of gravity, a weight constantly trying to achieve something and not getting there. And the more I would exert myself, the more I would expand until eventually I would be so tired of fighting that I would have no choice but to float, remain, and restore.***After our sun-baked nap, my roommate and I went to the grocery store for provisions. It was there, sitting on a bottom shelf, that I found my salvation.
“Unclogs Even the toughest drains! Liquid Plumber Works!”
For some reason, adding more liquid on top of an already existing lake didn’t seem like the most proactive way to fight a clogged artery. I figured, though, that it was more proactive than what I had been doing: crying.
Pour one half of the bottle’s contents into clog or standing water. Wait fifteen minutes and then rinse with warm water. For tougher clogs use whole bottle and wait for up to thirty minutes.It was hard for me to grasp that so much pain, so much turmoil could be cleared up in fifteen minutes, but I was willing to give it a try. If not, I thought, I can always keep bailing.I faced my sink with the sort of tenacity that one would face down a nightmare. Unsure of whether or not I would be the victor, but knowing it was necessary. I poured half of the bottle into my sink and watch this slightly yellow liquid break the surface. I imagined it barreling straight down the drain like a torpedo and blasting apart whatever hairball or small woodland creature was blocking my pipes. Instead it sank beneath the surface of the water and seemed to disappear. I thought maybe, like my antibiotics, I couldn’t see it working, but it would still be effective.And then the waiting. My roommate and I sat on the couch watching music videos, but my mind wasn’t on the music.
What if it doesn’t work? Will I have to call a plumber? Is that helpless? Will my roommate leave me? Should I then try another bottle? I could move. Yes, if this doesn’t work then I will just move. To a new apartment, with a new sink. Perfect.Fifteen minutes passed and I gathered my wits to check out my disaster.
Nothing.
It hadn’t moved.
For me, there is a distinct pain associated with utter disappointment. The bottom of my stomach drops out and my knees lock, while my jaw clenches as tight as it possibly can. Much like the day I lost my fourth grade spelling bee, this was no different. Unlike my fourth grade spelling bee, though, I didn’t follow my disappointment with rage. I turned on the hot water full blast, ripped the cap off the miraculous Liquid Plumber and dumped it in. I took an old electric toothbrush and swirled it around, jamming it down the drain. Quickly, I tired of the toothbrush and dropped my hands in. I was pulling at stray hairs and black crud, things that looked like fingernail clippings. I shoved my index finger down the drain and swirled it around. It came up black, but I just wiped it off and did it again. Sweat was beading on my forehead and I couldn’t open my mouth to save my life.
I thought,
If this is how I go down, then so be it. I won’t bail out.I washed my hands and left; resigned myself to brooding on the couch, nestled my head into the couch cushions and exhaled. I thought about how nice it was, just moments ago, to be sitting outside, soaking and baking, and just existing. For the first time in days, I noticed, my throat didn’t hurt. I closed my eyes and I relaxed.
“Hey, you fixed the sink! Good job.”A voice floated into the living room.
“What?”
“The sink. It’s empty.”
I was off the couch and into the bathroom faster that something really fast. It stared back at me. A dirty, stained, foul smelling porcelain sink basin. Completely without water. I turned the faucet on to a slow trickle, just waiting for the liquid to backwash. Only it didn’t. I turned both the hot and cold handles all the way up letting the water run full blast. Nothing. It all went down. I laughed, probably more maniacally than joyously.
***
The next day, a best friend, a former boyfriend, stopped by my place to say goodbye. He was leaving the city and changing directions. Something that always sounded foreign and terrifying to me.
Truth be told, there had been a disconnect between us. A clog. Things we heard from mutual friends, party faux-pas, old grudges never relieved. I was never sure if he noticed, but there was, within me, this need to be unbearably close to him, like I am with my roommate, and incredibly distant from him at the same time.I would think of everything we never got out of our mouths when we were together and couldn’t help but wonder if I still owed those things to him. What was the difference between things unsaid and things withheld? And how can you reconcile that difference? Standard really, I guess.
I have this habit of projecting the future. I must play out every possible scenario for how something could go before I actually experience it. Some people want moments like these to be magical. Some people want farewells to be understated and simple. I couldn’t care less. To be truthful, I am usually so busy internalizing that I’ve already decided how I feel about the situation.
This farewell, however, there was no scenario I could create. I wasn’t sure how it would go and what it was I felt. And it wasn’t the magnitude of the situation that clouded my vision, it was just my block. I couldn’t see the drainpipe for all of the crud. We sat in my mostly unfurnished living room, me on a couch he had given to me long ago, making small talk. I asked the polite questions (Where are you headed?, When are you leaving? Where are you staying?) and he answered in return. He gave me a ceramic dragon, he had painted in his younger days, that I had always teased him about. It provided me my second genuine laugh of the weekend.
It neared midnight and I knew he would be leaving soon. If there was a time to say things, all of the things, it would have been then.
“Well, I had better be going.”
“Yes, I need to go to bed.”
A stinging doubt began to creep into my mind.
This is it. This is the moment we lose touch. I am bailing.I followed him to the door, to lock it behind him, and we hugged.
“I hope,” I began, “I hope you find what you’re looking for out there. I mean that.”
He smiled, “Thank you.”
A few more pleasantries were exchanged and he went to leave. A few weeks before this stilted stand, I had told him I loved him. I meant it in that we are connected in our souls and have great friendship, but, being drunk, it came off more slovenly, somewhat like a cockney bar maid. I hadn’t regretted saying it, but it didn’t help the awkwardness. One more spigot full of water. He turned to me.
“And I love you too.”
A smile crept across my face and he was gone. My life wasn’t changed and waters weren’t clear, but I was there, in the moment, floating and existing.
That was a start.
