I am unabashed at the urinal- one of my prouder attributes. While some men need a second or two to get going, I am pissing right out of the gate. While some men’s streams falter when they find themselves with a neighbor, I find the company strengthens my resolve. When a line is growing behind me I easily find it within myself to power through a quick pee and make room. I once stopped to pee while being hunted by another human being. I’ve pissed myself on several occasions and would dare anyone to have faced the things I have without doing the same.
Peeing is not a problem, for me.
But there is something about ‘The Great Outdoor Urinal’ that gives me stage fright. The lead-up, maybe. The dark. Maybe it’s the smell- not like a bathroom but not quite like a forest, either. Like an old wax museum. Like a cellar.
Maybe also it’s the bear, which must be tense with inaction somewhere in the room. ‘The Great Outdoor Urinal’ sits in a massive room, but it’s tightened by the presence of that bear.
‘Some things meant to be fun and folksy become terrifying with age. These are your worn-down statues. Your elderly clowns. Your debatably-safe country zip-line tours. Your rickety bridges. Most communes.
‘The Great Outdoors Urinal’ seems like that same sort of thing but it was built that way in 2023, crafted with careful details to make it terrifying from the start. So, where many animatronic shows use darkness to conceal the unforgiving machinery that puppets their mascots, ‘The Great Outdoors Urinal’ is just a little more dark than necessary. And it’s secluded- the owners have purchased all the land off the shoulder of the interstate but ‘The Urinal’ is a full hour away from the nearest exit with nothing inbetween.
More than anything else, thought, ‘The Great Outdoors Urinal’ is strangely exacting. Its shell is made of cement and steel. Its faux forest is carefully arranged and always clean. And it only except urine as an activation method. Attempting to pour water or lemonade into the urinal shuts off the lights and upsets the bear. So much as spitting in the urinal before peeing will often result in the same sudden anger. It is reported that bringing a container of someone else’s urine will do, but that animal urine is out, and that ‘The Great Outdoors Urinal’ can differentiate in the blink of an eye.
Come with a full bladder, traveler, and expect a show.’
The bear has only been pictured twice, at least as far as the internet is concerned. Both are frantic and blurry- the bear only approaches when someone has attempted to trick ‘The Urinal’ into accepting something other than urine. In one, a hulking figure is just visible between two false trees and on the edge of a beam of light. In the other, the bear’s face is caught by sunlight from the open exit- unapologetically fierce and mechanical in contrast to the contrived peace of the overall display. Neither picture indicates that the bear is bound by cords or tracks. Nobody that has ventured off the trail to the urinal has found the bear or discovered a hatch from where it might emerge. The somewhere-presence of the bear makes this whole thing very uncomfortable.
So I think that’s why I falter, at first. Why I struggle to find my stride. It’s the same feeling of guilt I sometimes get when I leave a store without buying anything- afraid that some manager thinks I’m stealing or that somehow, something has appeared in my pockets that will set off the alarm at the door.
I’ve had enough water to need to go. I haven’t had so much that it will be watered down and unrecognizable. The chances of my releasing anything but urine have got to be near-zero.
But still, I stand dick-out and afraid.
-traveler
