I work in an industrial setting, a place where the extent of pleasantries are warm meals and the scattered BBQ. One very unpleasant thing is the toilet aka "the shitter", aka "the outhouse", aka "the crapper". But dare I say the washroom - as no washing of the sort occurs here, except maybe the luxury of having hand sanitizer. You can't call it the bathroom because you certainly do not bathe there. What I'm talking about is a small shelter build for one purpose and one purpose only.
Some may contain a tiny heater that does a splendid, often time overwhelming job of warming this enclosure. Some may contain air fresheners and some magazines, but it does not mask the primary use. It's raison d'etre is to poop!
A lot goes on on these work sites and a lot of people frequent them, especially on frac day. As many as 20 people in the run of 4-6 hours may experience their bowel movements in these not so sterile boxes. You could imagine the state of “the crapper” when all is said and done. They do get cleaned from time to time, in fact I’ve seen it done once in all my 4 years working in the patch. It isn’t the nicest place to do your business and some sites have nothing at all –use your imagination – most do.
A company representative also dwells on the location, he is what we call “the consultant” or “company man”. This person is a glorified secretary with many years of experience in the oilfield, they are extremely knowledgeable about operations and usually gets paid over $1000a day. They stay in what most call a shack, a portable office trailer, and every office trailer is equipped with a toilet. Some trailers - most in fact - have fully functional washrooms with showers, bedrooms, kitchens, office area and lounging area. These trailers are the envy of all on location, sometimes the medical personnel are lucky enough to have them but only on jobs where they stay there 24/7.
On this particular job the Medic or Bandaid as they are often referred to was relieved and a female came to replace him. I have no problem with that and why should I? Most of the medics I’ve worked with are female.
Several days ago I noticed the female medic walk from her truck/medical transport unit (basically a truck with an in bed camper with medical supplies in it and the capability to carry a stretcher) to the consultant’s shack. I thought to myself she’s going to see him about something, I also knew that the consultant wasn’t in his shack but rather out at the wellhead. I expected the door of the office trailer to open again shortly after she closed it – realizing he wasn’t in there. This was not the case. I figured maybe she would yell out in the trailer to get his attention as some trailers are 60 feet long and have many rooms and he wasn’t in the office area, I assumed it would take 30 seconds tops for her to come back out, but she did not. She was in there a length of time in which only one thing most likely happened. Roughly 5 minutes she was in there. A time I assumed only one thing was accomplished – a poop. She was definitely doing her poop.
Now she gets to poop where the consultant poops, the only 2 people that are permitted. It is certainly a privilege to be allowed to use this throne. None of us that are here day in day out are permitted to use it. We get here at 6:15 AM every day and usually don’t leave until 7 or 7:30 PM, most of my day is spent here, save the few hours back at the hotel.
Why is she allowed to use the bathroom and we have to resolve to using “the shitter”? Where the hell are equal rights in this picture? Do women not want to be treated just the same as men? Well then why the hell can’t they poop where the men poop? If equal rights was in the picture she’d poop on everyone else’s poop, just like the rest of us. For that matter, maybe they should have co-ed washrooms instead of male and female. What’s so special about a woman that she can’t go poop where everyone else poops? I mean everybody poops!
I brought this up with my girlfriend and she said that maybe she doesn’t want to go use the “facility” where everyone else goes. She probably doesn’t want to go in there after everyone else has used it. Well Christ it’s not like I look forward to going in there. “Oh yes I can’t wait to get to work and see how the toilet is today.” I see her point fully, and I’m not making fun, but why does this girl get to go to a better drop off spot than I do? I don’t really appreciate the whole idea; I think I’ll go ask the Consultant what his justification is for it.
