I have walked from Astoria to the Unisphere before, but I never made the trip back by any means except subway or bus. Until today. The Unisphere and Flushing Meadows-Corona Park (FMCP) were not my destinations when I set out to ramble up Queens Boulevard and its environs. But somewhere around LeFrak City, at about 98th or 99th Street, I could see the New York State Pavilion and I just figured well, I’m about four-fifths of the way there, might as well motor on in.
The journey was capped by two magnificent finds: A working payphone outside the Madison York Assisted Living facility at 112-14 Corona Avenue, and a fully functional shitter into which I took one of the most urgent and righteous dumps of my flâneur years.
I laughed at myself afterward in noting how I made a series of calculations as to whether there was enough toilet paper on the roll to adequately wipe my ass after this extremely necessary evacuation of last night’s first steak dinner in maybe a year. I read once that when you park a car you subconsciously do a series of mathematical calculations in determining whether the car will fit into the space. I don’t know if there is a name for these equations but there could be, and there should be a name for the sequence of estimates and calculations that go into deciding if a full and effective asswipe will be possible with the supply of toilet paper available.
Then I ruminated on the relatively scant number of public shitters where I’ve taken a dump over the years. The first huge dump I ever graced upon New York was at the Cosmic Diner when it was at Columbus Circle. You had to ask for a token to get into the bathroom, which was about the size of a one-bedroom apartment. It was palatial, and with only one toilet situated in the far corner it felt like a prison shitter where you were video recorded. I must have dropped 12 pounds of turd into that receptacle, this after eating little more than the Cosmic’s Fish and Chips platter for 3 days straight. I remember coming out of that diner with stars in my eyes.
Another memorable dump occurred at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington. I had to go so bad and from what food and beverage I had consumed the night before I knew it was going to be a buttblast. So I was worried about offending or at least attracting the attention of anyone else in the Lincoln Memorial on account of its volume and splatter nastiness.
It might have sounded nasty but no one would have noticed. There was a constant and overwhelming din of sound from fans and general noise in that place. Maybe that was by design. All I know is I took a magnificent dump at the Lincoln Memorial, and no one noticed.
I took a lot of dumps at the Trump Tower back in the early 1990s. To this day I regard Trump Tower as the best public facility in New York for taking a shit. Rockefeller Center isn’t bad, either, but at times I’ve had the creepy sense that the Concourse poopery is a cruising joint, or whatever they call it when people send signals between the stalls with their feet that they want to hook up.
Both places have a janitor constantly on detail, which is a necessary factor in a public toilet being a joy in which to shit.
A memorable dump occurred at the Central Park Boathouse, site of the only working payphone in Central Park. I got there just as the janitor had finished cleaning the place. It was immaculate. Not that I would but I could have eaten off that erstwhile shit- and piss-smeared floor. With that ephemeral luxury as inspiration I pounded out one of that hardest, longest, most critical fecal logs in the history of human anuses. I deserved an award. I was bragging about that one for days afterward among my shit-friendly friends. Hooray for the Central Park Boathouse, scene of one of my finest dumps.
So many more monumental dumps in New York and elsewhere. Yet far fewer than you might expect for such a seasoned wanderer as I. Why haven’t I shit in more places? Well, I am not approaching incontinence, not yet at least. I mostly get my shit detail out of the way before leaving the house. I blame today’s urgency on the stringy, fatty slab of club steak I got at the Trade Fair last night. It was gross.
But it also seemed like my innards were piqued today by the introduction of Snapple Peach Iced Tea I got at a 7-Eleven on Horace Harding Expressway. From the moment I ingested that substance I knew my asshole was going to burst. From there it was on to the appropriately named Flushing.
OK, then, there is more to today’s journey than a working payphone or an urgent dump at the park. I’m just lost on what else there is to say now since I still feel like I came back from a foreign country. Flushing is not the foreign-seeming area. It is that stretch of Roosevelt Avenue from the 80s up to the 100s. I was there on Sunday, not for the first time but for the first time with my eyes open and my senses perked. That area feels like Scorsese’s New York. I look into the open doors of the predominantly mom-and-pop businesses and see entire worlds spinning in those narrow corridors. The neon at twilight lit me up. I’ve rambled through there twice in 3 days but next time I will find a dining establishment or bar in which to sit down. I want to know that side of New York. I want to know that overwhelming majority of New York that I might never understand if I don’t enter into it deliberately. I guess I keep waiting for New York to come to me, or for circumstances to make me known to it.
