Crisis Averted

Every Wednesday we go to church for a fellowship dinner and bible study. The girls go to choir and "mission friends" class. They love it and we love it. We always try to sit at our favorite table - which is right near the bathroom. That way, the girls can go by themselves to the bathroom while we eat.

Last week while we were there Sabrina was in the bathroom for a few minutes by herself. I went in to check on her. She was in the middle stall and there were two adult women in there too, waiting for the other stalls to become available.

I asked Sabrina if she needed any help. She said yes, so I said "OK, let me in and I will help you." I watched through the crack between the door and the stall frame as Sabrina hopped off the toilet, with her jeans and panties around her ankles, and walked (well, waddled) over to the door.

Sabrina reached up and tried to unlock the door. She struggled and was unable to reach it. As she became more frustrated, she started to ask for help: "Can't reach! Help me! It's too high!!"

I tried to calm her down, through the door, and told her that it can't be too high for her because she was able to get the door locked when she entered the stall. I told her to stretch her arm up, that I knew she could reach it. She started to cry.

The two women in the bathroom were trying to contain their laughter, but were unsuccessful. I told the ladies that it would not be funny if I had to crawl onto this tile floor under the stall door. I was dressed for court and not wearing the kind of clothes I wanted to lie on the floor of a public bathroom in.

Sabrina's fussing and fear intensified as she still could not get the door open. I really did not want to crawl under that door, but was running out of options. I debated having Sabrina crawl under the door to me, but that would have left the door locked from the inside and then no one could use that stall. I thought that would be wrong to do.

Just then fate intervened and Catherine walked into the bathroom. She, as you know, is tiny and is just the perfect size to crawl under the door of a bathroom stall. So I asked her to crawl under the stall and unlock the door for Sabrina.

Catherine had no qualms about the dirtiness of a public bathroom floor, so she immediately said OK, laid on the floor and began to shimmy across the dirty tile. Even I had to laugh at the sight of Catherine belly crawling into the bathroom stall. She looked like the guys you see in military training scenes on television shows: crawling under barbed wire through an obstacle course. Of course once she was in there she was easily able to unlock the door for me. Crisis averted!