Reprinted from the Winter Solstace 1990 EV Will and Word<\/p>\n
BATHROOM PARTY
\nOne day, i decided to let go all the intellectual stops and create
\na happiness vortex all my own. By now, i had learned to approach
\nsuch a task by asking these questions: What do i want? What’s the
\nproblem? Who can help? How?
\nIn short order, i discovered i wanted to throw a bathroom party.
\nFor a long time, i’d toyed with the concept of doing a theatrical
\nproduction in a bathroom because of the bathroom’s psychic imprint.
\nThe bathroom is magical! People routinely get naked there. Water
\nappears and vanishes. Things disappear in the toilet bowl. People
\nforce things out of their bodies. One can experience body-wide
\nfields of heat, cold, steam, and tingly water there. Mirrors are
\nstared into. Rituals of hygiene are performed. All interactions
\nbecome intimate. The bathroom is the most dangerous room in the
\nhouse (Most accidents take place there). It is a favorite place
\nin which to commit suicide.
\nFurthermore, the tub can be used as a stage, and lighting tends to
\nbe complex (window behind tub–say–and a door, and the bathroom
\nlight).
\nBut during those days of self-examination through creation of the
\nbathroom party concept, i saw that theatre as theatre wasn’t right
\nfor me. It was all too convoluted and cerebral. It lacked the
\nvery messiness, scattered and crowded style which had attracted me
\nto the bathroom in the first place.
\nI realized that all i wanted was my happiness vortex. Not to
\nteach. Not to do good theatre or laudable ritual. Not to make a
\npolitical statement. These things would, i could easily see,
\nappear and with gusto, but as secondary manifestations of my simple
\nlust to birth my bathroom party.
\nIt was at this point–where i’d rejected any artistic
\npretensions–that i quickly grew aware of a tradition of the
\nbathroom party. My most direct links were in the child folk
\ncultures, but i soon recognized it in both modern and ancient adult
\ncultures as well, in the folk and court\/society circles.
\nBathroom parties, though they haven’t self-consciously been
\nperformed as beads on a long traditional thread, are in fact a
\ncommon thing. There is the solitary bathroom experience, for
\nexample, of sinking into a tub of warm water and scented oils or
\nof frothy cool bubbles. There is the young hidden expression of
\nsexuality, which in inhibited modern cultures, often takes place
\nin the bathroom as well.
\nBut not all bathroom parties have been solitary. Sex is often
\nenjoyed in the bathroom, the shower or tub serving as mattress or
\ndance floor. The tub is often where the small child is introduced
\nto bathroom partying, naked and sitting up to the navel in warm
\nwater, surrounded by tub toys and joined by an older guardian.
\nSimple puppetry turns the tub of toys into a toddler’s theatre!
\nAnd bathroom parties are not exclusively an adult or baby
\npass-time, either. Kids and adolescents, herded into our school
\nsystem, let it all hang out in the boy\/girl segregated bathrooms.
\nThey meet to talk behind the backs of their jailers, script
\ngraffiti, fight and play, toke a smoke, jack off, talk love, and
\nso on. Girls keep it up, quite openly, past school age, and boys
\nget together too, but (as Woody Allen might say) “with an
\nexplanation.”
\nFurthermore, kids have a tradition of holding seances. One branch
\nof traditions is the Mary Worth\/Mary Wolf\/or Bloody Mary ritual.
\nThis is performed in the bathroom around either the toilet or the
\nmirror. Groups are all girl, all boy, or mixed–according to the
\nparticular tradition. The bowl or mirror is stared into in the
\ndark, and a chant along the lines of “I believe in you, Mary Worth”
\nis repeated a specific number of times (3 and l0 are popular
\nnumbers). A blue light is supposed to appear. Kid seances are
\nabout as effective as any other kind.
\nAnother branch of traditions is the girls’ marriage divination, at
\nleast one of which takes place in the bathroom. A candle is lit
\nbefore the mirror; a charm is spoken; and the face of one’s future
\nspouse (Yes, it’s awfully presumptuous) will appear in the mirror.
\nThese traditions are widespread and are passed down from child to
\nchild, generation after generation. There are traditions as grand
\nin age and decorum as the most ceremonious of these seances in
\nadult bathroom parties. They can easily be typified by reference
\nto the ancient Greek gymnasium. Modern locker room and spa
\nbehavior (especially sauna) clearly carry the tradition along.
\nNative American sweat lodges and Asian spas argue for an almost
\nuniversal network of bathroom partying traditions. Of course,
\nclass\/age\/gender sometimes kept such celebration from truly being
\nuniversal. The oldest public baths in the US are only about a
\nhundred years old, and most have been shut down, as have most of
\nthe baths that openly championed homosexual celebration. How many
\nof the poor or homeless can get clean in a dignified–never mind
\nenjoyable manner? Spas are for the rich in the USA (Even public
\nswimming pools–sometimes the same thing as a public bath–are
\nclosing down in NYC).
\nSo i could rest assured that i was not an out-and-out pioneer in
\nthis effort. I am not brave in that sense. I want to push the
\nenvelope (and how), not invent it. My birthday ’round the corner
\n(3 July\/Cancer), and the unwelcome return and reunion of two
\nrelatives whose combined neuroses threatened to reach critical mass
\non my day of days catalyzed me into action. I made a few phone
\ncalls, and one friend invited me over.
\nBased on my theory that birthday cake used to be little cakes, and
\nthat the fire used to be much less centralized under a single adult
\nguardian’s control, we exchanged cookies and lit a candle and
\nincense. I brought over my plush toy lamb, Sappho, and had her
\ncall down the blessings of my personal guide\/deity, Goldilox, in
\na few words initiating my friend and friend’s 2 year old into the
\nmysteries of Goldilox. I was nude, my friend wore a bathing suit,
\nthe babe wore diapers and shirt and had to be changed once.
\nEveryone played the harmonica at some point (babe learning very
\nquickly).
\nI had names of six songs my friend and i both knew written on slips
\nof paper (Babe was asleep then). We mixed the slips ’round. I
\nthen pulled out three and, from inside the tub (Babe awake by
\nthen), wove a musical review marrying the song triplet.
\nAdults drank screwdrivers, and the babe drank apple juice. I sang
\none of my folkish songs with accompaniment of a toy accordion.
\nBaby played with tambourine at one point while parent played on
\nharmonica and i did body percussion. Baby played with the stuffed
\nanimals as we looked on, clapping alot. Most of the celebration
\nwas recorded on audial tape. Much free discussion, gossip, and
\nphilosophizing went on throughout.
\nSleep, hugs and kisses brought the celebration to its amiably
\nexhausted close.
\nI find it significant that a child was involved in this. In a way,
\nit was mere luck of the draw. But for me, if there can’t be kids,
\ni’m scared away too. The gnostic masses i’ve been to have lacked
\nthe presence of children (even though they are called for in the
\nscript). Sure, it was luck of the draw, but seeking child energy
\nwas also a main priority for me. In all my dream lists of guests,
\ni worked hard to include a child or two–even if it all seemed like
\nwishful thinking. Also, i go to the mass in order to feel out
\ncertain recurring stories or themes in my life. I felt a more
\ndirect, visceral, and celebratory examination in this bathroom
\nparty than i would have felt had i gone to a gnostic mass at this
\ntime.
\nThe gnostic mass may be a great way to commune with a large
\nscattered group over long periods of time. But by asking one’s
\nself (not one’s ego constructs), “What do i want?” one can find
\nadventures that the mass merely keeps track of.
\n–g. saintiny, l99l<\/p>\n
SEX IS PEACE
\n TRUE WILL NOT SLAVERY
\n CONSCIOUSNESS IS STRENGTHtem, let it all hang out in the boy\/girl segregated bathrooms.
\nThey meet<\/p>\n
