The Man I Love Can Only Love Someone Else

People use public spaces as their own diaries. The profound words I have found scribbled on bathroom stall doors, stall walls, and mirror could fill their own book of Bathroom Proverbs.

Some of the best ones I've found were :

"Rock and roll is dead but that doesn't mean we can't dance with the ghost" scrawled across a mirror in the bathroom of a music venue in marker.

"God is a bully" written in minuscule handwriting on the back wall next to the toilet in a bookstore. The small writing made me feel like that person had truly felt bullied and beaten by God.

"J.P + me can never be because love could never save us" messily scribbled in lipstick on a bathroom wall tile in a middle school. I don't know how "in love" J.P and "me" were but it sounded profound. That kid is going places.

My favorite has to be one that I found in the bathroom of a restaurant.

"THE MAN I LOVE CAN ONLY LOVE SOMEONE ELSE"

It was inscribed across the inside of the bathroom stall door in bold, black ink. It was large enough to take up the entire space. The sentence was in all caps. It felt like this person was screaming out their pain via their pen and wanted every user of that stall to feel it too. I did.

I don't know who that person was or why the man they love can only love someone else or what that means exactly but I don't think I had to. The emotion was felt and my curiosity peaked. This could make for a good story.

There is a whole following of mesmerized bathroom graffiti lovers like myself as is shown on the website The Graffiti Project.