The Honest Truth

New York City. One of the greatest cities on earth. No matter how long you stay, there’s never enough time to see everything you want to. I was glad to have the last couple of days to myself. I’d been travelling with my friend Kristen, a great companion, but when it came down to it I wanted some time just to explore on my own.

Kristen left a few days before me, so my stars were aligned. After a late, hungover brunch with my friend’s roommate at whose apartment I was staying at we walked back to his place so I could pick up a lighter coat. After all, I’d be taking the subway downtown, stop at the brooklyn bridge, the world trade centre and then some shopping at the discount store Century 21.

I grab my coat and head to the washroom to “unload” before my trip. My stomach had been a little rocky these past couple of days. Too much cheese, conflicting with my lactose intolerant tendencies, too much booze, and not enough water. I was ignoring my bowels, and figured we’d figured things out when I got back to Ottawa. It’s New York City. Who gives a fuck about my stomach?

Turns out, I should’ve. I flush the toilet and get that dreaded sound of water filling the bowl instead of draining. If I had been in a public place, sorry to say, but I would’ve fled. I’ve got two days left in the big apple, and I can’t spend it looking at the china bowl. But this was not the case. I was staying at an apartment with three others, one of which had been extremely hospitable and I sensed had a mild case of OCD with cleaning. I had to make this go away before he noticed.

At this point, I had written off the next hour for figuring out a way to flush down the waste from the week. I took the plunger and tried to make the problem go away. I try a flush again and hold my breath. Shit. Literally. The water is full of it and it’s coming up threatingly close to the lip of the toilet bowl.

Okay. So maybe just the world trade centre and the clothing store. Scrap the Brooklyn Bridge. It’s just a bridge, right?

I sneak out of the bathroom so as not to draw attention to the fact that I’ve been in there an abnormally long amount of time. Neil’s at the other end of the long hallway and he’s on the phone. I can still remedy this without him knowing about my little problem. I grab a plastic bowl from the kitchen and lock myself back into the mathboz sized New York bathroom.

I scoop out some of the shit water and flush it down the shower. Because there’s less of it, the problem seems more likely to get solved, and the water starts to go down. I make a quick jet out the door to the nearest laptop on the kitchen table. www.google.com. How to unclog a toilet. I’ve got my pick of videos, websites, and even a wikipedia entry. After watching a hilarious british youtube video of a sullen woman delicately plunging her toilet. She advises me that if this doesn’t work I should use a coat hanger to get at the source of the clog. Shit. literally.

She also advises I get some plastic gloves, so I run to the nearby hardware store and pick up a pair of slick yellows. Feeling confident from the video tutorial, I arm myself once again with a plunger, this time with the proper technique. Fingers crossed. Flush. More watery shit.

At this point I decide to pay a visit to Neil. “Aren’t you supposed to be out?” he says, as I guiltily show up by his desk. “Um, you see, I’ve got a bit of a problem.” Now Niel is quite the hospitable guy. People are staying at his apartment all the time and he has a tolerance for things going wrong. But still, he has his limit, so after telling him about the situation, I assured him I’d handle it. Sensing my anxiety, he imagined what the state of affairs must be behind the door, and decided to take my word for it. “Call me if you need me.” He said.

I went into Emily’s closet and found a coat hanger. Back to the washroom. The toilet and I were getting close. I couldn’t even smell my own feces anymore. This is how people turn into savages. Fingers crossed. Flush. Still nothing but shit. At this point I was worried the shower was going to get clogged so I started scooping shit into a bucket. No, not from their kitchen. This was an actual mop bucket. I still had some sense of decency.

After another google search I decided to pay another visit to the hardware store to check for a toilet auger. According to the website, this was the last step before calling a plumber. This gave a new meaning to pissing away money.

I find a toilet auger, which looks like a long rod with a coiled metal attachment that goes down the toilet and you crank it in hopes it will catch the clog. I have no idea how to use this thing, but the guy at the plumbing store looks at me dryly and says “you just put it down and crank.” Alright. Turns out there’s two holes to “put it down” but only one was big enough. Problem solved.

After cranking the thing, which brought up pieces of shit but not the clogging culprit, I sat down defeated. Then Neil came walking towards the bathroom. Everytime he did I felt my stomach turnover. “Is it ready yet?” he said. “Um, look Neil it’s pretty bad in there. Just don’t go in.”
“But I really need to pee.”
“Neil, man, seriously, go downstairs to a restuarant.”

Neil left and I felt another wave of panic. What was the alternative to calling a plumber? I had tried everything. I googled New York plumbers and got in touch with a company that said they’d send someone in 15 minutes.

The buzzer goes off, I press the button, to let in Steve my plumber. Steve’s a jolly man, wearing green suspenders and a white t-shirt. “I’m really sorry you have to go in there,” I tell him. “Oh, don’t worry,” pipes Steve back. “I’m used to it running down the stairs.”

After taking a look Steve tells me the bad news: Either he can fix it with his heavy duty toilet auger, or he’ll have to replace the toilet bowl which will cost upwards of $300. “But I’m on vacation,” I plead with him, as if this makes a difference. “Well then you better cross your fingers this works,” he says.

Steve goes downstairs and comes back with a toilet auger so heavy duty it’s strapped to his hip. I stand back, watching nervously from the door. After a few minutes of fishing around, I hear a FLUSH. “What does that sound like?” he says, turning to me and smiling. I actually have no idea. For all I know the shit water’s about to overflow onto his boots. I give him a half hearted thumbs up, but if I could form a question mark with my fingers I would’ve done that.

“Yes, it worked.” he says. Sigh of fucking relief. Steve cuts me a deal (which in New York, means a whole lot of nothing). I pay him for showing up ($100), and he’ll tell his boss when he came I had fixed it. Instead of paying the companies fee (starting at $275) on top of that I’d give him $100 in cash. $200 to fix a clogged toilet on vacation? Didn’t sound like a deal to me. But Steve assured me it was.

As I closed the door behind him, I got this weird feeling like I didn’t know what to do. The toilet had taken up so much of my energy, that I felt lost. My day consisted of staring, plunging and flushing, and it’s all I knew how to do. This must be what it feels like to have your kid grow up and not need you anymore. The toilet was fine, but would I be.

After telling Neil what had happened, and accepting his generous offer to pitch in, I told him I was going to get some fresh air. It was dark outside, and I decided to take a stroll down avenue A. The good thing about being in New York is your are anonymous. No one had to know about my day. No one was expecting me to be anywhere. My clogged toilet story could stay between me and Neil and be flushed to the bottom of my memory. Then again, it would’ve been nice to get asked how I was and be able to answer “shitty day.”