By Georgia Grellier
Welcome back to Story Time with Georgia, where I relay weird stories from members of the CC community. Shoot me an email at g_grellier@coloradocol- lege.edu if you want to be Catalyst-column famous.
Who: Eliana Secunda ’22
When: Venice Biennale trip
What:
Eliana Secunda ’22, her parents, and her parents’ best friends Erin and Jim were on an artsy trip to the Venice Biennale, but on this particular day of the trip her parents were elsewhere, and she was exploring the city with just Erin and Jim.
The three had been strolling around for a bit when their conversation turned to how much time one should spend in the bathroom.
Erin flexed that her daughter, Shannon, who double-majored at the University of Chicago and graduated with honors, is the type of person who never takes a long time in the bathroom. Erin also prides herself on bathroom efficiency because “b*tch knows that people are waiting and it’s disrespectful.” Secunda’s bladder is on the small side, so she spends a lot of time in bathrooms, but she agreed with Erin and said she was the same way.
At some point during this conversation, Secunda realized she very urgently needed to pee. The three stopped at a nearby restaurant, where Secunda grabbed the key from a waiter before sprinting to the bathroom, which was in a creepy, isolated hallway in the back. Erin and Jim sat out- side and ordered beers.
Secunda entered the bathroom, locked the door, peed, and washed her hands without incident until she tried to unlock the door and the lock wouldn’t budge. There seemed to be no one in the hall- way and she had no phone, and beyond that, she spoke no Italian, so the situation wasn’t great.
“I’ll just be really loud while I’m trying to unlock it,” Secunda recalled strategiz- ing.
After around 10 minutes, she finally heard people yelling in Italian in the hallway and frantically rattled the door. She managed to have a successful enough conversation with an Italian waiter through the door that he went to get a different key, which finally let her out of the bathroom.
Approximately 20 minutes after initially going to the bathroom, Secunda re- joined Erin and Jim, whom she described as being like, “What the hell just took you so long?”
She was obviously mortified and is still recovering. Clearly bathroom locks just have it out for this girl.
Takeaway: This column is rebranding as anti-bathroom lock propaganda. Fellow victims, send your stories my way.