Tim Chitwood: Changing restrooms by mistake

Good thing we didn’t have these controversial gender restroom laws a few years ago, or I’d be in the bowl without a paddle:

I once used the women’s restroom by mistake.

I can explain: Some friends and I were seeing a lot of movies, back when we still had time, and in rapid succession were going from one theater to another, and in one the men’s restroom was on the right, and in the other it was on the left. And I got mixed up.

Either that, or one theater moved the men’s room to the other side.

Some businesses do that, you know. Sometimes they discover the women’s room needs more room. It’s not just that stalls take more space, but that some women are single parents who have kids with them, and they have to change diapers and toilet-train and all that.

Sometimes the women’s room needs space for a lounge chair, apparently. I guess if you’ve got to wait that long, you might as well sit in the lobby.

Some businesses switch the restrooms just to mess with people, I think.

A restaurant here did that once, and one night while I was out on the town I forgot, and walked cavalierly into the women’s room, before I stopped, getting the eerie feeling something was amiss.

Hearing “Twilight Zone” music in my head, I glanced warily around the room before the thought hit me:

Where are the urinals?

Then a woman back in the stalls cleared her throat, and I turned and ran.

As I rushed out, another guy passed me going in. Over my shoulder I saw him raise his hand to push the door open before he read the sign on it, and froze. I ducked out of sight.

After that, you might have thought I’d notice if again I walked into a restroom with no urinals, but one time I was in such a rush I didn’t catch on.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot

This was in 2002, apparently, when the movie “We Were Soldiers” came out. Some of the movie scenes were shot at Fort Benning, and I didn’t want to miss too much, because a lot of those scenes had Madeleine Stowe in them.

So I rushed to the restroom, used a stall, washed my hands and walked back out.

Where two women stood, frowning at me.

I was about to nod hello when it hit me, and I looked back at the sign.

Had I not been so stupidly shocked that one woman burst out laughing, they might have called the cops. So I am indebted to the one who went in first, heard what I was doing, thought it sounded rather … precipitous, and noticed my shoes faced the wall. She went back out and kept the other woman from going in.

Now some places like North Carolina have laws against going into the ladies’ room, were you born a man, so I try not to do that anymore. I always make sure I check the sign, no matter the hurry or which movie theater or restaurant I think I’m in.

No matter which restroom I believe I’m in, I take cover: I use a stall.

I should pick the urinal, just to make sure I’ll notice if it’s missing.

Stalls may be the answer to all this transgender restroom uproar: In a stall everyone has privacy, no matter who they used to be.

If you’ve seen some of the men who used to be women, you know that even if they’re compelled by law to use the women’s room, their shoes will still be facing the wall.

This story was originally published April 24, 2016 at 4:39 PM with the headline "Tim Chitwood: Changing restrooms by mistake."