Two Feet From Victory

I shit my pants at the Wynn in Las Vegas.

There. I said it.

I wish there were a more dignified way to begin this story, but there isn't. I was a grown man, staying at one of the nicest hotels in Las Vegas, and somehow my afternoon ended with me standing in a bathroom staring at my underwear and questioning every decision I had made that day.

It started with lunch.

I had eaten at one of the restaurants inside the Wynn and completely overdid it. I was in Vegas, I was hungry, and apparently I had decided portion control was something I would deal with when I got home.

I ate everything.

Appetizers. Main course. Sides. Dessert.

By the time I finished, I was so full that I should have just stayed at the table and accepted my fate.

Instead, I started walking back toward my room.

A few minutes into the walk, my stomach sent me a message.

"Bathroom."

Nothing serious yet. Just a notification.

I knew there were bathrooms around the casino, but my room was maybe ten minutes away. And for reasons I still don't understand, I decided I'd rather use my own bathroom.

Ten minutes.

I'm a grown man.

I've been controlling my bowels successfully for decades.

What could possibly go wrong?

So I kept walking.

About three minutes later, my stomach sent another message.

This one wasn't a notification.

This was a final warning.

I started walking faster.

You know that moment when needing to use the bathroom suddenly goes from being something you're casually aware of to becoming the single most important issue in your entire life?

I had reached that point.

The casino disappeared.

The people disappeared.

Las Vegas disappeared.

There was only me, my hotel room, and an increasingly hostile situation happening inside my body.

By the time I got near the elevators, I knew I had made a catastrophic mistake.

I wasn't walking normally anymore.

I was doing that very specific walk every human being instinctively knows how to do when disaster is imminent. Short steps. Legs slightly squeezed together. Butt clenched with a level of concentration normally reserved for bomb disposal.

I pressed the elevator button.

And waited.

Those were the longest eight seconds of my life.

The doors opened.

Nobody inside.

At two o'clock in the afternoon.

At the Wynn.

In Las Vegas.

I don't know what I did in a previous life to deserve that elevator, but somebody upstairs was looking out for me.

I stepped inside and immediately started pressing the button for my floor like hitting it seventeen times would somehow make the elevator move faster.

The doors closed.

I was alone.

Thank God.

Because halfway up, things became critical.

I grabbed the railing.

My legs were crossed.

I was breathing through my nose.

At one point I actually whispered, "Come on, man."

I don't know whether I was talking to the elevator, my stomach, or my own ass.

Probably all three.

Then I realized something terrifying.

If this elevator stopped on another floor, I was finished.

Every number that lit up above the door felt like Russian roulette.

Please don't stop.

Please don't stop.

Please don't stop.

Ding.

My floor.

I could have kissed the carpet.

The doors opened and I shuffled into the hallway like a man recovering from major surgery.

My room was down the hall.

Maybe fifty yards.

Under normal circumstances, nothing.

That afternoon, it looked like the final stretch of the Boston Marathon.

I couldn't run because running would have broken the seal.

So I developed this bizarre speed-walk where my upper body was moving forward while my legs were desperately trying to remain attached to each other.

Then I saw my door.

I've never been happier to see a hotel-room door in my life.

I pulled out my key card.

Red light.

"No."

Tried again.

Red.

At this point I was bargaining with God.

"I will be a better person."

Third attempt.

Green.

I threw the door open, slammed it behind me, and made my way toward the bathroom with whatever dignity I had left.

I had done it.

Against all odds, I had made it.

Elevator: conquered.

Hallway: conquered.

Hotel door: conquered.

The toilet was right there.

Victory.

I pulled my pants down.

And apparently my body interpreted that action as official permission to end the mission.

Game over.

I shit in my underwear approximately two feet from the toilet.

Two.

Feet.

I just stood there for a few seconds staring down at what had happened.

Then I sat on the toilet.

And started laughing.

Not chuckling.

Laughing.

The kind where you can't breathe.

I had just spent ten minutes performing an Olympic-level exercise in bowel control through one of the busiest hotels in Las Vegas. I had survived the casino. I had received the miracle of an empty elevator. Nobody stopped it on another floor. My key card finally worked.

I had beaten every obstacle.

And then lost the war two feet from the finish line.

I sat there laughing for probably five minutes because there was nothing else to do.

Eventually I cleaned myself up, threw the underwear directly into the trash, tied the bag shut, and stood in the shower thinking about how differently the afternoon could have gone.

If one person had gotten into that elevator?

Game over.

If somebody had pressed the button on another floor?

Game over.

If my key card had failed one more time?

There would probably be a hallway at the Wynn that employees still refer to as "the incident."

That afternoon taught me something I have carried with me ever since.

When your body politely tells you it needs a bathroom, don't negotiate.

Don't calculate walking distance.

Don't tell yourself you're only ten minutes away.

And definitely don't assume you're still in charge.

Because sometimes your ass isn't asking for permission.

It's giving you a deadline.