Office toilets are weird.

I’m OK with the toilets in my home. I know the bottoms that sit on them, and have seen them all naked countless times.

I’m OK with public toilets, too. They are so impersonal that I never think of the other people who sit on them. Those people are distant, they leave no trace of personality behind. It is as if they were never there, especially if the toilet is not busy and I never see whoever else was there before me.

But it feels strange to share a toilet with people that I kind of know, but not really: office toilets, toilets at friends’ homes, etc. Suddenly I am strongly reminded that other people have used that toilet. That those other people have bottoms, and that they pull their pants down, and then sit where I sat. Which is not the kind of thoughts that I normally have about my bosses, colleagues and neighbours.

It is interesting that we have become so far removed from our animal backgrounds that I can actually forget that other people have bodies and bodily functions, too – and feel weirded out when I’m reminded of them.