That is normally an innocuous question; whenever we move stuff around the battlefield or over the ocean by air or by sea our stuff is placed in containers called connexes. These hold all of our stuff and they have RFID tags so we can track where they are as they roll through different spots where RFID “readers” are located.
But everybody doesn’t know how to check the RFID tags online and it is sometimes a curiosity question as opposed to a real need. Our last connexes just arrived from the second boat and many of us got our “third” bag (we got to bring three bags; if you didn’t need it before now you probably didn’t really need it, did you?). Meaning it had clothes we could have used before and might need now. The good news is we can now pack our winter gear as we get ready to ship the “third bag” home in a month or two.
“Do you know where my containers are?” she asked as she stood there naked in the women’s bathroom. All 100% butt-naked full frontal nudity in all her glory without a shameless, modest bone in her body (and she saw the skin covering all the bones). Chief thought, “I mean come on, are you kidding me? Are you actually talking to me before I had my coffee AND while you stand there naked with all THAT hanging out?” Chief looked at her with her steely brown eyes and didn’t know what to say. She was speechless!
She thought about any of the following, “I am NAKED here! How would I know?!” or “Let me check… (Looking inside her own towel left and right) nope I don’t have them on me!”
Is there etiquette to use when you are in the common bathroom? Surely everyone has a comment or thought about this?
Here was a nice subject for our lunch, but it made it clear that many people don’t know and white people are the worst (that was an observation; maybe they are just comfortable being all shiny and blue veined…I don’t know).
Maybe they are just too bright? But for some reason the white people (allegedly) have no problem making gestures, waving their hands and talking to you MAKING EYE CONTACT when you are NAKED! And of course even worse when THEY are NAKED! MSG G.…who is the nicest woman in the world, but when you are over 55 years old talking to other people while you are 100% naked is normally unnerving and if the viewer ate recently it can be unsettling.
Did anybody see the movie “Harold and Maude”? I still remember the quote from the priest: “Priest: I would be remiss in my duty, if I did not tell you, that the idea of... intercourse - your firm, young... body... comingling with... withered flesh... sagging breasts... flabby b-b-buttocks... makes me want... to vomit”, and it was unsettling when I was 15 or so years old. Now that I approach an older age (Maude was 70 or so), my own gorgeous wife of course is beautiful beyond imagining, but for most women beyond the age of, say…25 there is a reason there are lights with dimmers, candles, curtains and dim light. Everybody looks so much better. And in a common bath room NOBODY wants to look at you in your complete nakedness under bright fluorescent light.
Either it looks old, saggy, and blemished or we are jealous because it is firm, young, tan and well cared for. Either way cover it up!
Bathroom etiquette; There are some rules that you should follow when in a common bathroom, and for those of you who didn’t know, please forward to any who might be uninformed. Commentary is not all my own, but it could be! (Lunch conversation isn’t normally like this).
This all came about because this morning Sexy Jake (SJ) came to the breakfast table, pulled out the chair next to the Chief and sat down. “Ouch! Ouch, what is that, oh, your hat!” he said and laughed and giggled and then started talking about stuff. But I could see that Chief (whose hat it was) was pissed. She was so mad that she wasn’t talking and had that steely eyed look. At lunch I said to her, “You know, when he sat on your hat I thought maybe you were mad because your sunglasses were in there. But I could tell what was going through your head was “What are you doing! Don’t you look before you sit down? Yeah that is my HAT!? What is WRONG with you!”
“Yep. That is about right! And I hadn’t even had my coffee yet. But come on! He put his butt on what I am now going to put on my head and all he can do is laugh and giggle?! From his butt to my head! Aaargh!”
And that got the conversation heading toward butts, nakedness and the aversion people have to that behavior and inattentiveness to other’s stuff or attitude.
Rules for the Bathroom and Toilet
1. 1. Don’t chat to someone you don’t know really well stark naked with your hands on your hips. Look; most people haven’t seen that many naked people outside of National Geographic or watching inappropriate stuff online or R rated movies. Those people all have the benefit of good lighting, artistic expression and makeup. You don’t and EVERYBODY needs some of that when naked in a bright light.
2. 2. Don’t bend over to adjust your iPod or bend over period with your butt towards anybody! I don’t care whether you are a man with a hairy butt and it hanging down or a woman with whatever there is to see, butt cracks and all the rest cause people to gag, choke, turn red and become apoplectic (and they weren’t even going to talk anyway! White people (like me) can be sooo bright that people have first been shocked and then blinded requiring medical care. Cover up: it isn’t a moon you are seeing…it is you’re A$&. Yeeeech!
3. 3. Don’t sit on the bench naked! Your back end has had the brown coming out and who knows what else. I don’t care if you just took a shower….the gal before you didn’t! Bodily fluids and residue are considered to be there even if they aren’t, so if you sit know that everybody who saw you will think you haven’t got a usable brain (because you were sitting on it!)
4. 4. Wear shower shoes INTO the shower. This isn’t Japan. Shower shoes are to be worn into the shower not just TO the shower. Shower shoes (flip flops) are to prevent athletes foot and other related fungi. People do all kinds of things in showers involving body fluids and a wise woman or man would want to protect their feet from all of that junk. (That reminds me of a story about guys and their shower body fluids and politeness…but that isn’t appropriate in a family blog).
5. 5. When you are out of the shower put on clothes or a robe. Stay clothed until you are ready to get into the shower. I know; you are a nudist. You love walking around your house or your CHU butt naked to let your body air out, your body parts sag and swing and get back to nature. Good for you! Don’t tell everybody else! People prefer you clothed. Common courtesy requires you not walk around naked forcing others to see where you shave and where you don’t, what you scratch and what you won’t. Where your rash is, your unique physical qualities or anything else like that. The army requires everybody to only wear army clothing to and from the latrine from your CHU. No bunny slippers, negligee, panties, red shirts or anything else that you feel like. Not even a robe! You can wear the army PT uniform in any combination: sweat pants, sweat shirt, long sleeve shirt, short sleeve shirt and the nylon shorts. And that makes it that much worse!
6. 6. Just because you are totally comfortable with your nudity, nobody else is. Everybody thinks you are just like them; normal, a Soldier who is a little boring but good at what you do. After they see that funky tattoo above your pelvis or in the small of your back, piercings in different places (I didn’t know you could pierce that!), sagging and swinging this and that, hairy here and not so much there and those thighs! That stomach! Furniture disease! (Where your chest has fallen into your drawers) man boobs, in men and every other skin blemish or undesirable body trait anybody could ever have. Nobody wants to see it except either the slightly perverse or the incredibly curious. (So THAT is what it looks like! Or OMG I didn’t know people could have that and still function!)
7. 7. Don’t talk to naked people. Whether they are naked in the shower, naked getting dressed or undressed or if you even think they might be naked: Don’t talk to them! People are by themselves when they are taking a shower and getting dressed to start their day. They haven’t had their coffee. This Army stuff is a big adventure when you are 22 and a big pain and a violation of privacy when you are over 25 or more. Sure, most people can HANDLE it, but why should they have to?
8. 8. Never make eye contact with naked people and don’t ever appear to be looking at them! Sometimes you will see out of the corner of eye something that you have never seen before; a tattoo on a shoulder or arm, a tramp stamp perhaps or a body part that you have always wondered about: for women? “So THAT is what implants look like! So real, but they don’t move!” or for men: “I always thought he had big hands, but that guy is a horse! Holy Smokes!” Eye contact just proves that you must have been looking at them or a part of them. So instead you stare at the floor, stare at your shampoo bottle but don’t make eye contact and don’t stare! (Didn’t your mother tell you it is rude?!”)
9. All of the above includes when people are using the toilet. Don’t talk about business (you CAN ask to borrow the TP if you are out) and don’t look over at another man when he is urinating (no “meat” gazing!) because they are sensitive about that.
So let’s recap: When you are in a public shower you don’t talk to people unless you really know them, don’t stare, don’t gesticulate when completely naked, don’t bend over and show your butt to people and don’t put your naked butt on the bench! Wear shower shoes, save work talk for work and avoid eye contact. People go to the shower area to take care of their business and not to have an extra social hour. Never talk to people except for “’morning, hi, excuse me!, see you at…” And nobody wants to answer the question “Do you know where my containers are?”
The Apocrypha has the Book of 2nd Nudicus, which has been largely discredited, however I think it is a fitting quote for this post.
2nd Nudicus 5: 17 " Go not into the bright light naked! For it is a shame to you and those who see you."
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