The View From the ‘Hil: Mirror, Mirror

I don’t usually venture into school bathrooms—partly because of the related horror stories—but largely due to my fear of public restrooms in general. Until a few weeks ago, it wasn’t necessary to face my fears.

I was innocently listening to my teacher discuss the principles of air resistance when my neighbor leaned over and tapped my shoulder.

“Sahil,” she said, “you’ve got some dried soap by your ear.”

Instantly I realized what had happened—that in my rush to school 10 minutes beforehand, I had neglected to thoroughly rinse my face after soaping. As if the lack of hygiene weren’t bad enough, I worried that people might compare me to Ben Stiller in the scene from “There’s Something About Mary,” even if our situations were very different.

Believe me, it was nerve-wracking.

And despite my reservations about the school bathrooms, I knew there was only one place I could go to wash the soap off my face.

But when I got to the bathroom, I was distraught to discover that there wasn’t a single mirror in sight, except for a small one by the ceiling. Afraid that I wouldn’t get rid of all the soap, I scrubbed until my skin was so raw and tender that all day, people were asking me if I was suffering from a skin rash.

But what made the feeling worst was the fact that it could have been so easily fixed by the simple addition of a few mirrors above the sink.

I’m not alone in my suffering. When my friends have gotten a contact lens stuck at the bottom of their eyes, I’ve had to use my finger to readjust it for them. When my female peers need to adjust their eyeliner during the day, they have to do so without a mirror—meaning that they usually overestimate. Quite frankly, it’s not only distressing but also rather gross.

Usually, I can pay attention in class with little to moderate effort. But the task becomes a lot more difficult when students have to worry about personal hygiene all the time.

I can understand that vandalism of school mirrors might be a concern. But it still seems strange that the school trusts us with dangerous chemicals and not with mirrors. We’ll encounter mirrors in the real world, won’t we? Here is as good a place as any to learn to respect restroom facilities.

Honestly, most students won’t abuse the privilege of getting real mirrors in the bathroom. The most conceivable side effect is that a few students might spend too long fixing their make-up in the bathroom. But on the bright side, we’ll all look better.

And besides, mirrors mean that students like me won’t have to wander around all day with self-induced rashes on their faces.