Observations concerning a necessary event

There arrives a time in life when you should not sit on or in anything that places your knees above your waist. Like Neil Sadaka said, “Getting up is hard to do.”

Peter Ustinov knew, too. When he received word of pending knighthood, he was asked, “Can you kneel?” The question, he said, should have been, “Can you get up?”

Or, John Pinette’s response when a personal trainer mentioned situps: “I don’t do ups.”

All of that has to do with a rather unmannered subject: Bathroom facilities at my in-law’s house.

This happened more than twenty years ago, but the reality still exists.

For some reason, my in-laws decided anyone using the sit-down appliance should do so about 18 inches from the floor. I am 6-feet, 1½ inches tall. Placing the lower part of my body in a sitting position 18 inches from the floor is not comfortable.

Not content with lowering the height of the necessary facility, my in-laws also equipped their commodes with padded seats. And, the maker of those seats had decided an average American backside is 12 inches across. I say, Nay, nay.

When my wife decided to replace the sit-down facilities at our house, she chose the right size – waist level with knees and width to fit older Americans.

Distasteful, I know. But words of advice anyway.