I never thought of loving a toilet before, but I am happy with our new composting toilet in our bedroom. So is Maria.

(Photo, our bedroom 5 a.m. The toilet is on the other side of the door.)

It will not only prevent falls down the stairs one day while rushing to the bathroom, but it is easy, sanitary, inexpensive, and practical in the climate change era. The toilet is just what the manufacturers say and promised. No surprises.

I never thought of writing about a toilet either, but guess what – it’s a beautiful picture at night when the light inside is one and our former outhouse door peers into the night. I thank my photography, which brings life to truth and reality.

We did need to build a small bathroom around the toilet, which is in a corner of our rather large bedroom. We couldn’t afford to take the house apartment upstairs for new plumbing, and there was no reason to. Our new toilet does everything the others do except flush.

A surprising number of people have been writing to ask me how Maria and I feel about the toilet, something I never even heard of a year ago. Our Nature’s Head composting toilet went operational Sunday; as of now, we have used it at least once.

I’m trying to be delicate about this, but I promised to share the experience, so I will say we’ve only urinated, no bowel movements for now.

We have a bathroom downstairs, so this toilet will have limited use – at night and in emergencies; Maria can speak for herself and has, on her blog.

We are happy with the cost, clarity, ease of use, and structure that Dan Rogers built around it. The toilet makes sense in many ways, at least for us. We have no complaints. Maria will put her artistic genius to work and make the room warm and colorful.

There are only two of us; we live in a small farmhouse and have a working bathroom downstairs. Looking down the road, it seems wise to have a bathroom upstairs, as older people often need to do. It isn’t something I like talking about, either. But it’s important and hopefully useful.

Being open is being open. The blog is the story of my life and the people who enter it, and eliminating is a universal experience. It’s a creative challenge to write about it.

If you are like me, I’d recommend hiring an experienced plumber, carpenter, or handyman to help set it up. It wasn’t a problem for Maria, but it was beyond me.

Once set up, it is almost shockingly simple to use.

It is well-built, solid to sit on, and straightforward to clean. If needed, you can drop toilet paper into the bowel opening, separate from the urine bucket.

I’m persuaded that there will be no odor. The toilet is self-contained.

The bucket has no odor to date; we always have the fan on as suggested (it’s silent and draws very little power). The fan takes any odor outside and keeps the composting material moist. It has to be moist to absorb the waste matter.

We spray water and vinegar into the town after each use. The composting material – we use coco coir – comes in small blocks (very inexpensive) and needs soaking in water before use. The company recommends using the cheapest toilet paper, it is absorbed more quickly than the good stuff.

The bowel section, as I call it, is emptied but otherwise self-cleansed.

The composting is done in the bowel movement compartment.

If it’s not used much (ours won’t be),  the compost is removed every month or two by putting a 13-gallon garbage bag over the compartment, turning it over into the bag, and taking it out to the compost heap; if you have one.

The urine bucket needs cleansing with a cleansing spray. The company recommends water and vinegar.

I was nervous about using this new toilet but quickly overcame it. It’s comfortable and easy.  It’s just like going to the bathroom. Men should sit down on the toilet, not urinate standing up.

Almost anyone, even young children, could use this toilet. Still, it’s especially timely and relevant to camping, traveling in RVs, living in tiny homes, or living in old ones like ours without much solid plumbing. I believe a toilet is the future, for all kinds of reasons.

All kinds of people are using these toilets now, and from the reviews I’ve read, they like them. They are drawing much attention in states where water is becoming a major political issue.

I’ll keep providing updates, but I wanted to write and say this has gone very well so far, and we are 100 percent pleased with it. I write this hoping to be helpful as long as people want to hear about it.