By
Justin Snider
, Amherst College
Get a Whiff of This!
Disclaimer #1: The following article is not for the faint of heart
or the easily queasy. It contains words and thoughts that might well make you
uncomfortable. The respectable person, in any case, would read no further.
Parental discretion is strongly advised.
Disclaimer #2: The word “fart” is fairly new to me, so please
overlook any detectable prudishness in my voice throughout the next page - I
have tried my very best to eliminate any hint of it. The problem is that I was
taught from birth to use an altogether different word - “buster” - and it
wasn’t in fact until college that I gradually made the transition to “fart.”
It was, to say the least, a tough transition. I am still quite hesitant when
using the word, always unsure when it can or should be used in conversation. The
grounds for my painfully slow buster-to-fart changeover were twofold: 1) “fart”
remains an unacceptable word in my parents’ house, so overcoming the stigma
attached to it - they put it on par with words like “suck” or “crap,”
just a step below the “real” cuss words - has been difficult; 2) I
mistakenly believed for quite some time that the word “buster” was
universally used and understood. As it turns out, “buster” happens to be my
maternal grandparents’ ingenious invention since the word “fart” sounded
much too dirty to their ears. My mother, unaware of the word “fart”
throughout her youth, dutifully introduced “buster” to her children, and I
imagine my siblings will do the same with their offspring. I will not. Just as I
champion picking one’s nose in public (without any reservation whatsoever), I
am all for farting when one must and for calling it what it is: a fart.
Euphemisms simply won’t do.
So at the opera last night - huddled with hundreds of others in the “cheap
seats” (which are so cheap you actually have to stand) - I realized how lucky
and blessed we are that farts are invisible in this world. I can only hope the
same is true in the afterlife. Imagine for a moment if farts were visible!
Frankly I don’t think I could continue living. It’s bad enough that farts
smell and all too frequently make a terrible racket. But most of us, save the
very shameless, have mastered the fine and delicate art of the SBD: the
Silent But Deadly (fart). We therefore have free reign to rip in public - on the
street, in class, or even (gasp!) in the opera - with anonymity and immunity all
but guaranteed. And this is not unimportant, for the passing of gas is a
biological necessity and thus feels downright good. Even orgasmic on occasion, I’d
dare say. I fart, as I imagine you do too, whenever the need arises. It was
Descartes, if my memory serves me correctly, who famously proclaimed, “I fart,
therefore I am” (or something of the sort anyway).
