The Harm in Asking: My Clumsy Encounters with the Human Race (12 page)

I’d like, for a moment, to discuss the problem of my gas.

I fart with unimaginable frequency and force. That said—and before venturing further—I’d like to acknowledge the philosophical divide.

There are two schools of thought when it comes to flatulence.

“Farts are funny,” says the first, propagating the belief that although farts are gross and immature, they are nonetheless amusing.

“Farts are awful,” says the second. “They’re the easy and pathetic jokes of those with nothing else to say.”

It wouldn’t stand me in good stead to pretend I don’t lock horns daily with issues of originality, with the issue of being disgusting. I acknowledge those components. It’s just, I still think farts are funny.

I have always been a problematic farter. My need to fart is constant, and has given me the lifelong sense that I live on borrowed time.
How long until I fart again? How long till that next bomb goes off?
It’s a sense of impending doom, and it’s with me every second that I’m not alone.

As a kid, I’d overhear complaints of surrounding adults: “That kid just farted. She just farted
loud
, and then kept right on walking.” I spent my high school years muscling my anus shut, suffering gas pains that felt (I’d later learn) like exploding ovarian cysts. As an adult, I’ve been prevented from doing yoga. It’s simply too dangerous doing ass-in-air stretches in public.

It is not an issue of what makes it better or worse. It is not like,
Oh, I’ll just lay off the broccoli
. The solution is not simple. The problem is never
not
there. Like the stalk is to the broccoli, farts are part of who I am.

My close friends know about my problem, and have, at different stages, described the sound of my emergent gas in different ways. I’ve been told, “You sound like a screaming ibex,” “You sound like an Austrian man blowing an alpine horn,” “You sound like a dirt pig who is retarded.”

While the sound is impressive, it’s got nothing on the odor.

One time I ate an entire fried onion and then went to visit my friend Maggie. While together, I farted nonstop for three hours.

“You smell INSANE,” she’d said. “It’s like mold and milk have been left to brew in some dank, dark space, and that dank, dark space is your body. I mean, your farts don’t even smell like farts, really, so much as they smell like … 
decay
.”

“And sulfur?”

“Yes. There’s a sulfur component as well.”

AS TO MY
point about the philosophical divide, some friends find this funny, while others find it gross. My friend
Kate and her husband, Chris, for example, find me really gross. I spent this one Labor Day weekend with them in a hotel room in the Hudson River Valley. We’d chosen a room with a balcony and two double beds—one for them and one for me—and although we had an okay day of it, I ruined our night with my gas. It was so profoundly bad that Chris and Kate made the eventual decision to pay for a rollout mattress. They put it on the balcony and made me sleep outside.

I had no problem with this course of action. I remember what I smelled like on that day, and it was frankly fair enough.

My
issue was just that I thought Kate, Chris, and I should have been able to laugh about it the following morning.

But instead they acted pouty.

“You guys,
what
is the problem?” I asked. “Why are you still in a mood?”

“Because you ruined the hotel room, okay?” said Chris. “Even after you left, it was gross.”

Then Kate piped in.

“Honestly, Sara. It was like you rubbed your gas
up
in the fabric or something.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t, okay? I did not
rub
my farts
up
in the fabric.”

“You know what I mean.”

“No,
you
know what
I
mean.”

The three of us did not travel together again.

WHILE THE FRIENDS
who find it gross can be a challenge, the ones who find it funny are a joy. My friend Rachel, for example, finds it really funny. My friend Rachel is a joy. I’ve known her since high school, and back in 1995 she made a point of telling me how much she loved
it when I farted. She told me never to hold back. She said, “I’ll plug my nose if I have to. I just love how hard it makes me laugh.”

“
I
love how it hard it makes you laugh,” I said, and happily obliged. There was one occasion in particular where Rachel and I were sitting in her bedroom when I felt an explosion en route. I made the choice to let it fly and, if I may say so myself, it was a standout—a real champion—lasting five seconds, and sounding rather like a small machine gun. Rachel laughed hysterically, which made me laugh hysterically, which, in turn, forced the rapid-fire gas out for a victory lap.

This time, though, it emerged in perfect rhythm with my belly laughs:

Ha *fart*! Ha *fart*! Ha *fart*! Ha *fart*!

Rachel laughed harder, which made me laugh harder, which made the cycle carry on for another thirty seconds.

It was a sweet exchange made even sweeter when Rachel’s dad called up from downstairs.

“Rach!” he called. “Can you check if the dog took a dump? Something down here smells disgusting!”

It took ten minutes following Rachel’s father’s request before either she or I had the necessary breath to speak. When finally we did, Rachel lifted her hand to her face. She wiped at her tears. She said, “Your ass-reach is
so … wide
, my friend. You
are
the farting master.”

IT IS NOT
just friends who know about my problem. Boyfriends also know. The issue’s too pervasive for them not to. The time always comes when I have to lay it out. I’ll say, “I am going to fart,” and then I’ll fart, and then I’ll say, “Yes. So I have farted.” This will then segue into a monologue about the extent to which I am plagued by my riotous ass. It’s a horrible burden, but at the same time
it’s an effective bellwether for the relationship itself. If the boyfriend answers, “Oh! Thank
God
we’re at that stage!” that means he and I will grow closer. But if, conversely, the boyfriend acts bewildered, that means I’ve kicked us onto borrowed time.

I had a boyfriend named Jon from ’05 to ’06, who fell into the first of these two groups. When I told him of my gift, he said, “Well, the thing is, I can top that. I am able to fart … 
on command
.”

“Really?” I said. “Well, okay. So then fart on command.”

“Fart
with
you, you mean?”

“Fart with me, I mean.”

And then:
He did
. Jon farted
along with me
. It was … wonderful. We felt … so close.

Jon was a Boston native and Red Sox fan. During the course of our relationship I lived in a studio apartment in which the bathroom was right beside the bedroom. One morning, I awoke with Jon in bed beside me. I had spent the previous night at a Yankees game. I was not one for baseball usually, but I had accompanied a friend there because it was her birthday—I’d felt atypically obliged—and anyway, in the row in front of us there’d been a gaggle of Japanese tourists. They’d spent the entire game cheering for Hideki Matsui.

“MOTT-SUE-EEEEEEEEEEE!” they had cheered. “MOTT-SUE-EEEEEEEEE! MOTT-SUE-EEEEEEEEEEE! MOTT-SUE-EEEEEEE!!!!!!”

Eventually, the phrase cemented itself in my brain, and that next morning I walked into the bathroom, sat down on the toilet, and went:

“MOTT-SUE-EEEEEEEEE! *Burp* *Fart*”

“MOTT-SUE-EEEEEEEEE! *Burp* *Fart*”

I should clarify: I did not say the words “burp, fart.” I made the actual sounds.

I remember the event because the sound
and
smell were the things that woke Jon up that day. He’d said, “First off: fuck the Yankees. Second off: your ass just woke me up.”

I DO NOT
hide what I am from my boyfriends. I do, though, hide
all
that I am on first dates. It is a challenging task, to be sure. However, after much trial and error I’ve arrived at a solution to accommodate an inconvenient truth:

You must not hold in your farts if you are dating.

Doing so results only in painful cramps and bloating, and what good does that do in whatever slimming outfit you’ve got on? So. Your only choice is farting. Not loudly and proudly. But sneakily. Craftily. Cleverly. My time in the field has taught me as much, and—as I am pure of heart and generous of spirit—I will list my tactics here:

Remember—and exploit!—this simple truth.

In conclusion, I’d like to point out that I am not actually pure of heart and generous of spirit. Yesterday, I raced an obese lady for a seat on the subway having figured it’d be good for her to have to stand. I’ve been feeling guilty ever since, searching for some manner by which to redeem myself. Anyway, I’ve since admitted farting. I’ve since explained
stealth
farting. I do believe that, karma-wise, I’m set.

I was not—I
am
not—a true non-drinker. However, my alcoholic consumption is so controlled and infrequent, that actually, ostensibly, I kind of am. As evidenced by my stopwatch, backpack, and bagels, by my vomiting and farting, I am poorly suited to drinking and/or partying.

I learned this about myself early at the start of my college career, and while I did accept it, I did not let it lay rest to any of my old desires. I still craved a means through which to seem cool and a little bit wild.

In pursuit of my goal, I climbed one rung up the substance ladder. I tried my hand at marijuana.

I’D MADE IT
all the way through high school without ever smoking pot. Because my peers who did, they’d been either
(a) popular, or (b) in possession of a
filthy
head of hair. And I’d avoided the folks with filthy heads of hair, and was myself avoided by anyone/everyone popular.

College, however, changed this situation by widening my social pool. Toward the end of freshman year, I met a guy named Howard through my friend Kate, who, to remind you, is not/was not partial to my gas. Howard was Kate’s boyfriend years before Chris, and I absolutely loved him. Howard laughed at my gas and projected an overall air of cleanliness. More to the point, he smoked a lot of marijuana. I felt comfortable around him, so when eventually he offered me a joint, I decided to accept.

I sure was glad I did. Marijuana, as a substance, seemed to suit me. I smoked only joints, though. I never inhaled from bongs. Bongs evoked images of high school students with filthy heads of hair, whereas joints—the physicality of smoking them—made me feel like Lauren Bacall. I liked my pot joints long, so I could hold them like a cigarette. I felt cool in that position, and this coolness helped compensate for the minutes following the inhalation when, without fail, I would eat huge amounts of cereal and suffer minor hallucinations. I would hallucinate any number of the following:

These hallucinations were pleasant and entertaining, and though I lacked the confidence and dexterity to do what’s called “packing a bowl” or “rolling a joint,” I nonetheless called myself “a pothead.” The term conveyed a wild side that juxtaposed nicely with my Lauren-Bacall-smoking-position elegance. I claimed the title despite never smoking
pot more than once a week. I’d find myself in the path of Howard’s extra-long joints, and I’d accept them, saying, “Thanks. I’m a pothead. I love a toke.”

“Do you mean
to
toke?”

“Yes, exactly.”

The process of me actually going out and
buying
drugs was less feasible than the second coming of Christ. Despite my growing experience, I still could not determine how much marijuana was “an eighth,” nor interact with dealers of drugs, nor sellers of pipes. Such activities connected me to the illegality of the drug, and despite my previous experience shoplifting packaged ham, illegal activity made me really anxious. I could handle smoking pot in Howard’s dorm room. Or maybe—
maybe
—in a park if there were other people smoking too. Handing over a wad of cash, however, in exchange for a tiny plastic bag was another thing entirely. I was too afraid of being caught. I imagined that if ever I let a drug dealer into my dorm room, I’d be arrested by the SWAT team that would follow in behind.

An unwillingness to buy pot and/or its related paraphernalia puts a cap on the seriousness of the relationship that develops between a pothead and her pot. At least, that’s how it was in my relationship. The two of us lasted six months.

IT WAS THE
summer between freshman and sophomore year of college, and I spent it back home in suburban Chicago perfecting my recipe for chocolate-covered pretzels. The only scheduled break in the routine was a visit from Howard and Kate. They were in the midst of a cross-country summer drive and had included a stop in suburban Chicago as a personal favor to me.