a wedding gift from hell

Jenn's story about giving the grand tour of her newly remodeled house one New Year's Eve reminded me my most memorable wedding gift. One that I would like to forget, but can't.

We got married in my homestate in the Northeast. When we returned to Texas, my in-laws gave us a wedding party, in our newlywed home.

In preparation, SAM and I had done a bit of spiffing up, painting our bedroom the color of "Softness" for example (a mauve color, for those of you who don't keep a paint wheel by your computer screens). A few wedding gifts had arrived early, including blue towels we had registered for. So those were hanging in the newly bleached white tiled bathroom.

A cherished lifelong friend from Lousiana had arrived on her Harley lowrider with her mother strapped on the back. When they finished unpacking, I started to show them around. By this time the party was in full throng. About 50 guests were making merry.

After oohing and ahhing over Softness, my friends and I proceeded to the master bath. I spotted something dark hanging over the rim of the white waste basket. In one of those seconds that felt like hours, I zeroed in on this dark thing. What the hell is that? What the fock is that? Is that a turd? Yes.It.Is.A.Turd. A giant, glistening, man-sized turd draped on the rim of the white wastebasket in a white bathroom. And my guests are right behind me. Holy shit. No pun intended. And there was nothing at all holy about it.

In a flash, and before my guests could see, I grabbed one of my new blue hand towels, mercifully located just above the wastebasket. With towel in hand I flipped the turd inside the bin and threw the towel on top. I squeezed beside my guests, rushed it outside, and set the wastebasket on the ground behind the air conditioner unit. Will deal with that gem later.

Noone was the wiser. My guests didn't seem the least phased. They had just ridden four hours on a motorcycle so I suppose their brains were a bit foggy.

Later, when my husband and I had time to discuss the mystery poo at length, we started looking over our guest list. Who would have taken a shit on the wastebasket that was three feet away from the toilet? Why? How was that managed, exactly, the turd so evenly laid upon the wastebasket rim? Think about it, people. And think how you might have fared, under scrutiny for such a foul deed?

My husband immediately pointed to one of his distant relations, a kid who was in young elementary school. The kid looked troubled, he argued. He'd always thought something was wrong with the kid, he insisted. You don't know this family like I do, he went on. I do admit, the child had big dark circles under his eyes and looked like he was up to no good. I still have an image of his face burnt into my memory, him looking up at me, later that same evening. And yes, the guilty expression haunts me.

But I defended that poor kid. "That was an adult turd. A man-sized turd. It did not come from the anus of a child." To this day SAM insists it came from that child. I counter it came from an adult. Though what adult would do such a thing is not something I care to dwell on.

The next time we had visited with this family, maybe a year later, I found myself engaging the mother of this child with a slightly more indepth line of questioning than I might have done under normal circumstances. SAM was eyeing me down the table, giving me a subtle, knowing nod, with one of his familliar "see if I'm not right" expressions written all over his face. My undercover investigation did not yield much, however, except for learning that the dad was determined the child would become a linebacker in the NFL one day (the kid was on the runty side and never played football, unless punting football shaped turds into wastebaskets counts). He is smart as a whip, deans list and all that.

So these many years later, we still have not settled or agreed upon the ownership of the mystery poo. I've filed that away under one of life's mysteries better left unsolved. I have, learned since, however, with plunger in hand, that yes, small children can, indeed, leave man-sized turds.