Humiliating Moments-Chapter Two: The Panties

As can be deduced by the title, this is not the first hub on this subject and very possibly it won't be the last. Fortunately, it is not a series in which you HAVE to read the previous Chapter to understand what is going on as it is pretty self-explanatory. You may wonder, though, WHY I wrote it and that is very easy to explain.

First of all, I didn't have to work very hard. There was no research to do, no writers block to suffer trying to think of what should happen next, no second guessing the ending. I already knew how it ended because I was there.

The main reason, though, is because of all the awesome comments I received from Chapter One-The Bridge Story. I wrote it just for fun and was curious whether anyone would even read it since it didn't teach, sell or inform anyone about anything other than human nature. My nature to be exact. So this hub is for everyone I promised a second story to. It may not measure up to the original, but then, the sequel never does.

There were seven of us living in a house in Lagos, Nigeria, three couples and one single guy. We were there at the very beginning planning stages of a large construction project. Since this house was going to be our home for several years, we had been busting it trying to get it into clean, comfortable, livable shape. This included getting two guest rooms ready for two more couples who would be living with us for about a month during contract negotiations.

For two weeks we were doing everything, like scraping, rebuffing and sealing the floors, repairing walls and painting, sewing new curtains and making bedspreads as well as purchasing items for the guest rooms like lamps, kettles, mugs....etc, all the things you would find in a hotel guest room. We really wanted our guests to be comfortable and enjoy their stay with us.

We thought we had plenty of time with nearly a week to finish before our long- term guests arrived. Then we got word that the Nigerian branch committee wanted to have the Construction Committee meeting at our house on Friday, which was only two days away. That meant that our two guest rooms would be filled earlier than we expected and with Branch Committee members and their wives. It is no exaggeration that we were working on the rooms nearly up until the time they arrived Thursday afternoon. We really wanted to make a good impression since this is the first time we had visitors from the Branch office since we moved in.

Things were going well and the following morning after a successful breakfast, one of the visiting wives was helping us clean up in the kitchen. We inquired as to whether the bed was comfortable and whether she could think of anything else that the room needed. We talked about that for a minute and then she dropped the bombshell on us. Here is how the conversation went from there:

Matter of factly she said, "Oh, by the way, we found a pair of panties under our bed."

Stunned, my friend and I just stared at each other and then at her. Then I said, "Do you mean men's or women's?", knowing full well that she wouldn't have called men's underwear "panties", but hoping just the same.

"Oh, it was women's panties", she said, "but they were clean, so don't worry."

"What were you doing looking under the bed!" Probably not the most tactful thing I could have said, but I was trying to put SOME kind of humor into the situation.

"Well, they weren't really UNDER the bed, but on the floor by the edge of the bed spread."

By now the two of us are totally horrified and there isn't really anything much else to say, except:

"We are so sorry about this. I cant imagine how it could have happened or how we could have overlooked something like that."

I had thought of all kinds of other things to say, like "We had to try out the room first just to make sure it was comfortable." Or, "We were just trying to anticipate all your needs.", but for once I didn't let my mouth run without my brain. So what did we do? Basically, we groveled and it seemed to work.

After our visitor left to go back to her room, we got with the other woman who lived in the house and told her the story. We were all laughing because it WAS funny, but in a nervous, hysterical kind of way because the worst was yet to come. We still didn't know which of the three of us the panties belonged to or what kind of shape they were in except that they were supposedly clean. (Only those of you who only own new, pure white, totally unfrayed underwear with every bit of the elasticity intact can cast the first stone.) We joked about it a bit all morning thinking that they must have been folded up in the sheets from the laundry, but how could you make the bed and not notice? How could we all have been in that room doing all the finishing touches and have none of us see them? So our morning went, and we all laughingly said that we weren't going to claim them no matter what. If we had lived without them so far, well, you can figure it out.

After lunch and the guests had left, we all felt the relief because the pressure was off to make a good impression and we could all relax again. One of the women and I went upstairs and were looking at the now empty rooms and there, neatly folded on the chair, was the pair of panties. It only took one brief glance and I had to say,

"Yep, those are mine."

One lesson to be learned here is to thoroughly check your guest sheets for stray socks or panties before you make the bed. More importantly though, we can learn to not take ourselves too seriously and realize that the ability to laugh at ourselves is priceless. Take that MasterCard!

There is also one thing I can always be sure of....If there ARE any underwear stuck to YOUR sheets, they definitely won't be mine.