The Bathroom Gene

Genes are funky things. Our genes and how we manage the qualities they bring out in us finally define who we are. There are those who would argue that our Jeans are what bring true definition but that’s a whole other article that I will write at another time. For now, we will just stick to our Genes.

I have always found it fascinating the way different family characteristics and traits are passed on. Even more fascinating, is how forgotten genes sometimes show up quite randomly after skipping a generation or two. How lovely if we could dictate how our genes combine! I would’ve chosen my mum’s curly hair and my dad’s green eyes. Instead, I have my mum’s brown eyes and my dad’s straight hair; I have learned to embrace this combination. I have my mum’s love for literature, poetry, cooking and my dad’s love for building things, guns, motorbikes and music. I have my mum’s resilient spirit, faith and focus. I have my dad’s soft heart and sentimental nature. I have some of their not so good points as well, but obviously I won’t list them out for you! I will say, however, my parents are both fun loving people and happily enough, I have inherited this quality. Now, I look at my children and they are such a unique blend of my husband and I; so perfectly combined in equal measure. But recently, I discovered the strange side to genetics – the “happy mischief” genes and their management. Turns out I must once again manage many of my “happy mischief” genes – not in myself but rather, in my 7yr old daughter! Even more shockingly, I recently discovered that there exists such a gene as “The Bathroom Gene” and my daughter appears to have inherited this.

Let me take you back to my school years…

I studied in a very prestigious, all-girls convent school. I know, that sounds very staid but I assure you, it was the most fun place on the face of the earth. We had a beautiful set of teachers. They were gracious and graciously strict. We were graciously obedient while gracefully bending the rules. This delicate balance consistently maintained the fun factor at optimum level. There are countless stories I could tell you about the craziness that we thrived on; while maintaining good grades of course. However, I will restrict myself to the context at hand. 

It was 1999 and I had graduated to the High school block of our school. Our classrooms were located on the 3rd floor overlooking a breathtaking concrete Olympic style sports field, beautiful trees framing the arena and several vintage style buildings scattered across the campus. The view and the balcony railings did inspire us from time to time. I do remember my friend and I doing a spoof performance of Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet’s flying-type-scene at the hull of the Titanic – complete with a bunch of other girls singing “My Heart Will Go On” in the background. Yet, the most attractive feature quickly became the bathroom block at the end of the corridor. The bathrooms were located at one end of the very, very long balcony style corridor and the high school staff room was at the other end – such a secure layout for mischievous students like myself. 

I had a bunch of like-minded, hilarious friends and soon enough, I was the percussionist and one of the founding members of a very strange high school music band – The Bichapori band. Everything about our band was hilarious – the whole concept, the songs we wrote, the objects we employed to create music (loose change, pencil boxes, bells, etc), the “album” we recorded “live” (using a tape recorder) with the whole class as an audience, the fancy hand drawn artwork on the album cover… We were like a hot and happening underground spoof band and like all underground bands, we needed some sort of place to go “underground” for “concerts”. Sometimes, for larger audiences, we would use an empty classroom at lunch time but mostly, our favoured choice of venue was the bathroom. The generously sized bathroom area had the cubicles branching off a corridor and at the end of that corridor was an elevated stage-like structure which truly gave us the feeling of standing on a stage and performing to a crowd of people. So it was, we would meet time after time for clandestine music performances and laughs were never in short supply. Then there were the short (and hilarious) drama performances, dance performances, fancy dress undertakings, etc and our beloved bathroom “stage” continued to serve us well. Now and again we would use the bathroom for more obvious laughter invoking activities like locking someone in the toilet cubicle, water games, etc. Clearly, we loved playing in the bathroom. It was funny and it came with the dangerous thrill of possibly being caught by one of the teachers. Yes, we were caught a few times but those were different days. The world was a simpler place and children were allowed to be children. Our teachers would allot us some embarrassing punishment and life would carry on. Our parents never heard about any of this – well, most of the time at least!  In those days, the school system was constantly finding reasons to keep children in school rather than maintaining a strike count to suspend or expel them – they believed that keeping a ‘spirited’ student in school was the best punishment one could issue. The schooling system did not live with the paranoia that every child was a delinquent in disguise or a social disaster waiting to happen. But as I said before, this was largely because the world was a simpler place. I owe my Engineering degree to this old school of thought. Although, till this day, my mum cannot make sense of this childhood love for playing in bathrooms. Until recently, I couldn’t understand why this seemed strange to her. And then my 7yr old daughter came home with a written warning from school…

The orange warning slip read, “For playing in an out of bounds area”. I was shocked as I read the slip. She had obviously broken the rules. But how badly? I summoned Shannon and angrily asked her to explain herself. I stared at her in disbelief as she explained that the said “out of bounds area” was none other than the school bathroom! As it turns out, she informed me, several of the girls in her class loved playing in the bathroom. Apparently, it was also an excellent place to have a conversation and it was a charming pass-time to crawl under the doors. My temper went from zero to ten in 5 seconds and I bellowed at her, “How shameful! Why the bathroom Shannon? Don’t you have any other place to play?” She looked up at me with innocent eyes and said, “Because it’s funny”. As she said this I suddenly realised that all these years later, here I was, staring down at my child who, by the strangeness of genetics, had inherited my love for playing in bathrooms. I, clearly, was now my mother – completely lost on why all other worthy play areas would be bypassed in favour of a bathroom. Yet, in the midst of this imagery, I suddenly felt my anger melt away and be replaced by the desperate urge to burst into laughter closely followed by the urgent need to fight it away. I now had to be “mum” and instill discipline but how was I going to do this? The images from my own sojourns in the school bathrooms and the laughter resounding off the walls were flooding my senses. I was literally back in a long-gone moment – a bandana around my head, playing a stringed instrument while my friend danced to the tune with bells tied around her ankles as the small audience guffawed and cheered us on. I felt like a kid again. The joy of reliving that moment allowed me for a fleeting instant to feel how I did before I grew up – before I tasted the competition that lurks within the world, before I had to strive hard to build my list of achievements, before I had a dagger stuck in my back, before I tasted real failure/real disappointment, before I experienced the death of my best friend, before a boy broke my heart, before I tasted loneliness, before I realised that life sometimes passes by too quickly, before I realised that we can’t always make amends, before I met with broken dreams, before I learned that marriage takes sacrifice, before I lost a child, before I wrestled with God, before I realised that life isn’t a fairytale, before I realised that money is a hard reality, before life got complicated.  Yes, all of life’s scratches were momentarily wiped clean off the slate simply because I had once chosen to be silly in a school bathroom and as a consequence, the light and laughter was forever captured within my soul – to be unlocked whenever needed. 

Having said all of this, I fully understand that the disciplinary note issued to my girl wasn’t really about her choice of play area but rather about the obedience and discipline to followed and respected. I did what any good mother would do, I suppressed my urge to laugh uncontrollably. I suppressed the urge to blatantly tell Shannon to play in as many bathrooms as she likes and to build as many ridiculous, funny, summery memories as she can to serve her well whenever life throws a tiny winter at her (while always being careful not to hurt herself or other people along the way). I did what any good mother would do, I gave her the lecture on discipline. I gave my lecture with the theatrical flair of a mother who has never heard of this outrageous desire to play in a bathroom. Then, to seal the deal, I ended with a ridiculous proposition (I might have had to cough a few times in between to suppress my laughter). I said to Shannon, “If I ever hear that you’ve been playing or having conversations in bathrooms again, I will have to agree with you that bathrooms are good places to hang out. Whenever we have people over to our house, I will invite them into our bathroom to sit down for conversation and coffee. And maybe dinner too.” The look of bewilderment on Shannon’s face was priceless. Like any good mother, I delivered every dialogue with full faith that if Shannon is anything like me, she will still find ways to make sure her bag of funny and happy memories is bursting at the seams. 

I went to bed thinking I had taught Shannon something about life and obeying the rules. The real lesson, however, came from Shannon the next morning. She woke up her usual sprightly self – hopping around our home, singing, teasing her brother and generally bringing chaos to our household in her signature style. My husband, still upset about her episode at school, testily said, “Stop it Shannon! Aren’t you ashamed of yourself?.” Shannon answered innocently, “I’m very ashamed but you see, I just woke up and it’s the morning so I’m happy.” As simple as that – she was happy because she had woken up and it was morning. How I wish that I could wake up everyday thinking like Shannon. How wonderful if each of us could let our yesterdays be yesterdays and take our todays and just run with them. This was just as powerful as the lesson Shannon teaches me every year. Her age is always her favourite number. This year her favourite number is 7. “Because I just love to be 7”, she says. I’m now practising this. I keep telling myself that I just love being 30!

I’m not concerned that Shannon will grow up with an incurable love for bathrooms. I know, with full certainty, that one day she will be just as unimpressed by bathrooms as I am or as the next person is, for that matter. I know that one day the “Bathroom Gene” and all the other mischief genes she may have inherited will lie dormant or well reigned in, just as they are within me. In the meantime, I am here, standing by, fully alert watching glimpses of my long lost self shine through her – one arm outstretched to make sure she is gently guided back onto the straight and narrow and the other hand tightly clasped around my mouth to keep my giggles in check.