Poopie Man
While guiding at Katmai Lodge in Alaska, I had two guests for a week, named Joe and Tom. Both of them were good guys. Tom was a good angler, fished a lot at home in Wisconsin. Joe was tall and flabby, drank too much wine, was uncoordinated, and not much of an outdoorsman. Joe told me immediately he would not be wearing waders. He wasn’t getting out of the boat. He had rain pants if he needed them.
We’re out salmon fishing one day, about 45 minutes from the Lodge, when Joe says to me, “I gotta take a dump. How’s that gonna affect our program?” I said, “That depends, sir, on whether you can go anywhere or you require a flush toilet.” “Oh, I gotta have a toilet.” “We’re 45 minutes from the lodge.” “Let’s go.” We put the rods away and I run back to the lodge.
I tie the boat to the dock and help Joe onto the dock. He said, “I’ll only be a minute.” Tom and I sit back and relax, waiting.
Five minutes go by. Ten minutes. At fifteen minutes I say to Tom, “I’m going looking for him. What if he fell or something?”
I’m in front of the dining room when I see Joe coming down the walk. When he’s close I ask, “You OK?” “Yeah. Fine,” he says. I let him pass, and fall in behind him.
As we walk toward the boat, I cannot help but notice he has a string of shit drops all the way down the back of his right pant leg. I say, “Dude, you need to clean up. You’re looking kind of poopie back here.”
He looks over his shoulder at his pant leg. He pulls a napkin out of his pocket. He uses it to wipe off his pant leg. He puts the napkin back into his pocket, continues walking to the boat, and gets in. I do not help him, nor do I touch him all afternoon.
It was the single most disgusting thing I saw in the thirteen summers I worked in Alaska.
The preceding story is an excerpt from John Kumiski’s book, Thirteen Summers in Alaska.