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A gas station in Texas, called Buc-ee's. A hundred and twenty fuel pumps. A building the length of two villages. A grinning beaver, three stories tall, painted on the wall, holding a corn snack and saluting the parking lot. I read the signs three times. This was not a gas station. This was a temple, and the bathroom was its inner shrine. A man in a cowboy hat named Hank was refueling beside me. He saw me bow to the beaver and lit up. "Hey buddy, first time at Buc-ee's? You came for the bathroom, didn't you?" "...I came to relieve myself." "Yeah. Same thing. Wait till you see it. We got two awards. Two years running." "...I will pay my respects first." "You don't have to pay nothin', it's free." "I am not paying with money, Hank. I am paying with respect." Hank stopped. He looked at me, slowly. "Buddy, I have been coming to this Buc-ee's every Tuesday for nine years. I drive an hour out of my way. Nobody has ever said that to me about the bathroom, but it is exactly correct." A trucker at the next pump, named Carl, leaned out of his cab. He had been listening. "Hank's right. I run this route twice a week. Always stop here. Always." I followed the painted arrows inside. RESTROOMS. I rounded the corner. I stopped. Sixty stalls in a single row. Marble underfoot. An attendant in a yellow shirt wiping a counter that was already clean. Two framed awards on the wall: CLEANEST RESTROOM IN AMERICA. I removed my hat. I bowed at the threshold. I stayed bowed for a long second. A boy of perhaps seven, clutching a brown paper bag, watched me bow from beside the sink. He raised his bag with both hands. "Sir. Beaver Nuggets." "...A bag of small valors named after the beaver." "...What?" "Nothing. They are the offerings of this temple." "They're really good. Get a bag." His mother, behind him, smiled apologetically. "He has been talking about them all week. I told him we would get one bag. He has already negotiated me up to three." I used the facility. I washed my hands. I bowed to the attendant in the yellow shirt, who nodded back the way temple keepers nod at a pilgrim who has performed the rite correctly. I returned to the great hall. I bought six bags of Beaver Nuggets. The cashier, a kind woman named Becca, rang them up with a smile. "Big day, huh? You drove a ways to get here?" "...I drove from New Jersey." "Oh honey. That's a haul." "...I will return next Tuesday. Hank told me he comes Tuesdays." Becca paused. She looked at Hank through the window, who was still by his pump, waving at me. She looked back at me. "Honey, I have been at this register for four years. People drive in here from Arkansas, from Oklahoma, from Louisiana, on a Tuesday, because of the bathroom. You are not the strangest thing I have heard this week. But you are the kindest. Drive safe now." I walked out with my six bags. Hank was leaning on his pickup, finishing a cup of coffee. "See you next Tuesday, buddy." "...Until Tuesday, Hank-san." A temple does not visit you. You visit it. And the temple, in its kindness, places a man named Hank at the gate every Tuesday, so that the pilgrim is not, on his second visit, entirely alone. I have visited the bathroom in Texas. I will visit it again.