Explosive Diarrhea

It was my freshman year of college and my friend asked me if I wanted to see a play on campus. Before we went to the show, we met in The Pub, a small restaurant on campus in the basement of the theatre where the play was taking place. It was a Friday night during Lent, and being the good Catholic boy that I was, I ordered fish for dinner. The food took what seemed like forever to make, and we finally receieved our orders with minutes to spare before the play began. Frantically, I engulfed the fish and we ran upstairs to get our seats before the show started.

For this show, the stage was placed in the center of the room, with four large auditorium style bleachers set up around the stage. This meant, that in order to get to the seats, or exit the seats, you would have to walk across the stage. Between each bleacher there was a space in each corner of the stage so people could exit the theatre and the actors could come in and out of each corner. We found seats at the very top of a bleacher. As soon as we took our seats, an annoucnment was made that there would be no intermission for the hour in a half show, and that once the play started, no one could leave their seats because of how the stage was designed. It would also be dangerous to leave your seats because the actors would be running from all directions on and off the stage with swords and weapons. The announcer told the audience they had five minutes before the show started. Umm, no. The show began immediately after the annoucement, with no time to leave the theatre if necessary. As soon an the announcement was over, I had a terrible grumbling in my stomach and a feeling I had never felt before. I am lactose intolerant so I know what it's like to have to go to the bathroom. This was diffeent.

As the show began, the feeling in my stomach got worse, and fast. I began to sweat profusely and was sitting straight up at the edge of my seat, squeezing the arms of the chair ready to explode. I turned to my friend and told her I was going to be sick and needed to leave. She didn't know what to say or do and just looked at me. I could not hold it. I had no control over myself. Luckily I was sitting in an aisle seat and was trying to plan a time to run. The actors were running all over the stage and up and down the aisles of the bleachers. One actor came running up our aisle and was standing right next to me. I looked at him, and with a distressed look whispered, " I have to get out of here! I have to go now!" He was in a middle of a scene and looked at me with a confused face and had no idea what I was talking about. Almost immdeiately he was off running down the bleachers to continue his scene and I was right behind him following him and running across the stage. All the actors were dressed in Roman warrior type clothing, and here I was, in a large winter coat and jeans running across the stage. I made it back stage and was greeted by an extremely angry director. She began scolding me, asking me what the hell I was doing, while a group of actors stared at me not knowing what was going on. I told her I was going to be sick and needed to get out of there. With a disgusted look on her face, she looked at me and said that I exited the wrong way and would have to run across the stage again in order to exit the theatre. She said she would tell me when to run and then said "GO!" As a group of Roman warriors pushed by me to run on stage. So, here I was, again, running across the stage to get to the correct exit, in my winter coat, jeans and boots, looking terrified as the audience wacthed me with a confused look on their faces.

I finally made it to the correct side, swung up the doors, and two girls working the entrance yelled at me telling me I could not come back. As if I didn't already know that. I sprinted down the stairs toward The Pub where we had dinner to find the bathroom. As I opened the door to the restroom, there was a long hallway leading to another door where the toilets were located. I began taking off all of my clothes. My jacket, shirt, belt, everything. I COULD NOT HOLD IT. I made it to the stall, and in mid-air, before I could even sit down, it was over. EXPLOSIVE is an understatement. Miracuously, it all made it in the toilet. As I sat there in a panic, practically naked with a trail of my clothes in the hallway and restroom. I did what any sane person would do in this situation. I called my mom. As I was on the phone with my mother, I hear a knock on the restroom door and a woman's voice saying, "Excuse me, excuse me! Sir, we can hear you upstairs, would you please mind being quiet. It's a distraction for the audience." What? How the hell could they hear me from the basement?! Well, apparently, the restoom is located directly below the stage. I could hear the actors almost word for word, but it didn't occur to me that they could also hear me; as I tell my mother about what was happening and speaking passionately on the phone.

Once that was over, I picked up my clothes, got dressed, snuck out a back door in the basement and walked alone in the snow to my dorm. Well, that was my Friday night.

For the following days to come, people who were at the play, or in the play, would stop me on campus to ask me what I was doing or if I was a part of the show. I basically dodged the question and came up with some excuse like I had to leave to see someone, or forgot about something I had to do, not that there was a volanco erupting in my pants.

To this day, that was one of my most embarressing, yet hilarious moments I have experiened. So, if anyone is reading this that was there that night, now you know the real reason I was running around the stage like a chicken with its head cut off.

Pro tip: Never engulf fish.