While walking through campus, I already have to avoid cars blowing past stop signs, slipping on ice and eye contact with people whose names I’ve forgotten; I’d like to subtract stepping on giant loogies from my list.
Seeing people spit in public is one of the most disgusting things in the world to me and is made worse by having to see it on a regular basis.
Every day, I make the choice to either periodically look down at the ground while walking to avoid stepping on a fresh, frothy mess or to just keep it moving with my eyes up and take the risk of tracking spit indoors.
I will never understand why spitters insist on spitting when walking in public. Do their mouths produce an excess amount of saliva? Are they getting over a chewing tobacco addiction? Are they part llama?
I would really like to know, because according to livescience.com, our bodies produce around one to two liters of saliva a day and although admittedly, that does seem like a lot, I have never felt the need to casually expel any of it from my body on my way to class.
Some days, the amount of spit on the ground is so bad that it feels like I’m playing hopscotch trying to avoid it all.
It’s not just the seeing the spit on the ground that makes my stomach turn but the actual experience of seeing someone hock a loogie is what really gets me.
I can’t count the number of times I’ve been walking behind someone and all of a sudden, I hear that unmistakable, gurgled snorting sound as the spitter clears their throat, turns their head to the side and hurls a bubbly glob to the ground.
Of course, they know better than to aim it forward, or else they might have the misfortune of stepping in their own mess but as for the rest of us behind them, we are forced to look and avoid or ignore and step in it.
I won’t even get started on people who spit indoors, leaving their spit on the floor or the stairs. There’s just no hope at that point.
So to those public spitters out there: please, just swallow. If you can’t help yourself, use one of the many trashcans located around campus to make the daily commute to class just a little better.
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