Passing through the Charlotte Douglas International Airport and should have used the restroom on my last flight. My connection is boarding in 10 minutes and I have a 15 minute walk to that terminal and gate from where I arrived.

There is a relatively small men’s bathroom in E terminal, but then the terminal itself is small, as are the jets which process passengers through those gates.

Airports are pretty good at having enough bathroom capacity to keep men from ever needing to sneak a pee in a dark corner of a waiting area or vending vestibule, so I’m surprised there is a line that is coming out of the restroom that is barely moving forward.

Being short on time, I decide to peak around the corner and assess the situation more carefully. If there is a temporary blocker, like an attendant cleaning an area, I might wait out the disruption but if half the stalls are torn out due to upgrade construction, I’ll head to the next bathroom and take my chances with it being busy as well.

There are 7 urinals, 3 are not being used. They’re not damaged, they seem functional but they are open, even with a line of people waiting. I briefly consider that maybe the people in line are all poopers, in which they would need the stalls, which are all full but then 2 men zip up and two men from the queue take their places.

I immediately recognize the issue. The 3 open urinals are in between each of the other 4,  like this: U X U X U X U. I also observe that there is not much space between urinals, it could be shoulder to shoulder if all were in use. Further complicating it, there are no dividers and these urinals are like small ceramic baskets, not like the refrigerator shaped ones that provide some weiner masking from the sides, this is a case of men being bashful about their weiners in a space where you will definitely see some shapes from the corner of your eyes, whether you want to or not.

What I love about men, is that they are easily persuadable through leadership. Some men enjoy leading, most prefer to be led. They’re keeping form because some number 5 from an initial line, decided it would be best to leave some social distancing between men, probably when the line was short. Maybe they were still concerned about Covid spacing, maybe they observed too much splashback from the poorly designed pee catchers and wanted to keep their legs clean from other mens’ piss, maybe they were concerned someone would take a peek at their sex machine. Whatever it was, they waited when the middle spaces were open, and the trend held, a born leader.

This all comes to me much faster than I can type it out. I quickly understand the situation, assume the vacant leadership position, and put my plan into action. I look around the corner, give a knowing nod to the person previously in front of me and behind, and skip the line.

The moment I walk up to the #2 urinal, the spell breaks. Men immediately fill in the other gaps. Bathroom efficiency is driven back up to 100% capacity. The machine is humming, I’m shaking it out, zipping it up, washing my hands, and am on my way.

✈️