Because both my parents worked from nine to five during the summer when I was eight years old, I spent the days at the house of a neighbor who babysat me. She had two teenage daughters and two toddler sons of her own. Her two year old, Kevin, was in the process of toilet training; he was often put into big boy pants but had frequent accidents, and so was usually kept in diapers.
One afternoon I was watching television in the living room with Kevin beside me on the couch. His mother had put a pair of big boy pants (tightie-whities) on him, and— because the day was so hot – nothing else. She asked him several times if he was sure he would remember to tell her if he had to go to the bathroom, and reminded him repeatedly to do so. Kevin assured her that he would; the assurance of a two year old, however, is not something that one can always consider truly reliable.
Kevin and I were watching The Love Boat while his mother was in the kitchen feeding Kevin’s younger brother, Eric, and I was lost in episode. Kevin sat next to me quietly, sucking his thumb. When I happened to look over at him I saw a stream of pee running down the front of his tightie-whities and onto the couch.
Kevin took his thumb out of his mouth and called, “Peein’, Mom! Peein’! Peein’ now!”
Of course, his mother was none too happy. Exasperated, she snatched him up and hauled him upstairs to clean up. She shouted angrily, “You said you would tell me when you had to go! Why didn’t you tell me you had to go, Kevin?”
Bewildered, Kevin insisted that he had told her.
A few weeks later, Kevin, had been relegated once more to wearing diapers around the clock. He had dropped a really nasty load into his diaper and was taken upstairs to be changed by his sister, Teresa. I could hear her. She exclaimed in disgust the entire time. I don’t know what the kid had eaten for breakfast that day, or for supper the night before, but Kevin had truly dropped a bomb.
From the living room couch, I could see Teresa and Kevin, who were at the top of the stairs. She had put a fresh diaper on him and was carrying him down the stairs, swinging him gently by his arms as they went. When they arrived downstairs, Teresa sat down on the couch next to me with Kevin on her lap. Kevin sucked his thumb while the three of us watched whichever cheesy eighties Aaron Spelling show happened to be on that afternoon. A few minutes went by and then Kevin let out a grunt, followed by a wet-sounding fart. Teresa looked down at her lap and gasped, and she then lifted Kevin and stood up abruptly. There was poo oozing from Kevin’s diaper, and there was a fair amount of it on her jeans.
Poo continued to drip out of Kevin’s diaper and onto the carpet in lumps as Teresa rushed him toward the staircase, all the while yelling, “Oh no!” and, “Kevin!” over and over. By this time Kevin’s legs were really muddy and covered with brown streaks. Chunks of that brown continued to break loose and land on the floor.
Teresa rushed him up the stairs, and from the way it sounded put Kevin into the bathtub, and then she turned on the water. And as is my habit, I howled with laughter. I could hear Teresa freaking out from upstairs, heatedly, and apparently Kevin could hear me as well, because he laughed when he heard my laughter – the way little kids will sometimes do. His laughing made me laugh all the harder and the two of us carried on, howling, hooting, and giggling, for several minutes. Teresa was none too pleased with Kevin, nor with me.
I can’t say that I blame her. It sucks to get pooped on, and then to have to clean up doody from the floor (the poop trail ran through the living room, all the way up the stairs, and into the bathroom), one’s jeans, and one’s small brother. It probably sucks more still when people are laughing about it, especially when one of them is the perpetrator of the mess, and the other is a kid who has absolutely no intention of helping clean it up. I don’t know when Kevin ever learned to control his bodily functions, because the summer ended before he was given another chance to wear big boy pants.

Poop Report