He would be in a public bathroom (urinating, as it were) and some older fellow in the neighboring stall next to him would say, “I remember those days,” pining for the days when he could urinate with gusto.
As hard as that may be to believe, Allister swore it was true. And that it had happened more than once.
Now, Allister had never thought that he had some extra-strength pee-force.
And the neighboring tone was always so tinged with nostalgia and reminiscence that you could not mistake it for perversion. No, no. That guy was remembering moments he never would have imagined he would want to remember. Moments and streams at urinals across the country (and perhaps the world) that he had come in contact with throughout the tenure of his life.
It was not something Allister thought about when he thought about aging. That he would pee slower. Or even that, one day, he would miss his once-youthful stream. It made Allister wonder whether somewhere there was another guy, older than the first guy, who was pining for the days when he pined for the days when he could pee with more force.
And Allister never knew the proper response.
“Thank you,” would have been the easy way out. That would have shown that he was appreciative and it also tended to hide (perhaps) some of the uncomfortableness of the situation. But, there was always part of Allister that wanted to console the guy, too. To encourage him to keep at it because…well….because he had to.
Something in Allister that always wanted to say, “And you pee really good for your age.”