Code Brown

Probably the most invasive thing about living in Superchemoland is that not a single micturation (it means peeing) or bowel movement is allowed to go flushed. All of it must be examined and discussed by a team of doctors, nurses and lab technicians.

Freud teaches us (and his teachings are greatly clarified by followers like Otto Rank, Norman O. Brown and Ernest Becker) that anality is about creatureliness. Culture teaches us early on to feel a sense of privacy and even shame about what comes out of our bodies because such excretions link us via the body to death. Repression of our own mortality means repression of such unpleasant aspects of existence (and focus on the borrowed power that the more grand, heroic symbols of culture offer.)

This isn't to say poop can't be talked about. It should be managed as all anxieties are: with humor and acceptance (and with acceptance, even its own kind of pleasure.) But it's one thing to ask "What was Tigger doing in the toilet?" and another thing to get used to telling a new person every day "I took a shit" so they can essentially clean it up for you.

Childhood feelings about poop do not get unlearned easily. Thankfully, I guess. It should be hard to start sharing your poop with everyone just because someone asks. But until this process is over, it's just one more thing making me long for the comfort and privacy of my own home.