Libraries are typically considered to be fairly civilized, quiet spaces conducive to learning.
However, that is not always the case. Photo by Carol Highsmith.
Most folks reading this are likely grown-ups. We have jobs, mortgages, families and responsibilities. However, for guys at least, no matter your station or means, little is more reliably entertaining than a good fart story.
There I was, a second-year medical student. For the previous year and change, I had functionally lived in the library. I should have taken my mail there. In exchange for the absurd amount of time I had logged in that accursed place, I developed some super friendships and had been privy to some genuinely bizarre goings-on. One of the more memorable was a truly gripping tale of urban survival.
Cultural mores are regional. What might be socially appropriate in one part of the world is breathtakingly offensive elsewhere. Our hero in this case was a foreign student whose idea of what was acceptable behavior in public obviously differed somewhat from our own.
This is where I went to medical school. In addition to a great many radical experiences,
I was also once nearly farted to death by a foreign student in the school library.
The Guy
I was sitting peacefully with a half dozen fellow denizens in the library’s central upstairs study zone, my head buried in a pathology text, when the hapless villain strolled by. As might we all, I looked up, nodded, and smiled. These things I did without conscious thought.
Without preamble, this vile, rotten dude responded by ejecting the most earth-shattering fart it has ever been my displeasure to survey. Witnesses to the event later attested that they observed books falling from shelves and overhead lights flickering in response to the deafening ejection. In retrospect, it was a miracle no one was killed.
The Thing
Flatus is the release of gas — predominantly methane, carbon dioxide, nitrogen and hydrogen sulfide — from the gastrointestinal tract. This gas is a byproduct of the chemical and enzymatic breakdown of our food. The typical adult human produces between 500 and 2000 milliliters of the rancid stuff per day. It is the hydrogen sulfide that produces the distinctive objectionable odor.
Given the volume and resonance of the discharge, I fully expected it to have blown a hole in his pants. Discreetly covering his backside with a sheaf of papers, Flatulence Man strolled blissfully on. He unleashed one more ground-shaking monster before calmly selecting a seat nearby. He then began to dig out his books nonchalantly. Our eyes burned, and our ears rang, yet this dude acted as if nothing of significance had occurred.
The Aftermath
For one pregnant trice, all remained still and peaceful. Not one sound broke the utter silence of the scene. Then, like that awesome moment during the demolition of a towering building between when the charges go off and the massive structure begins to topple, I gradually raised my eyes. There, seated directly across from me and now adjacent to the gentleman with terminal gas, sat my classmate.
His eyes, watering uncontrollably, met mine. I bit hard into my tongue, nearly drawing blood before I succumbed to the inevitable. We both then unleashed an uncontrolled torrent of pitifully-suppressed laughter. Mine felt as though it escaped through my nose and ears.
I stood up and quickly made my way to a quiet spot in the far corner of the library, now laughing so hard I thought my eyes might bleed.
My buddy met me moments later, and we both savored the hilarity of the experience. We replayed the details verbally so as to ensure that, should one of us not live through the evening, at least the epic story might survive. When we finally had regained some semblance of decorum, we purposefully made our way back to our seats.
No sooner had we resumed our places did the flatulent gentleman now retrieve one of those nasal suction devices used on congested infants and go to work zealously purging his sinuses.
The resulting snorking sound very nearly loosened the ceiling tiles. I looked on in amazement as my buddy veritably leaped from his seat, apparently fearing that some of the voluminous nasal discharge might inadvertently affix itself to his person.
All decorum was now hopelessly lost. My prospects for a profitable evening of study had perished along with it. I gathered my gear and made my way home, sincerely but fruitlessly wishing the rest of my library pals productive scholarship.
Ruminations
I don’t recall having seen the flatulent gentleman with the atypical personal hygiene habits again stalking the halls of the library after that fateful evening, his potentially lethal bowels ever ready to strike.
We all felt his scholarly pursuits might be best exercised in a better-ventilated area. Regardless, I sincerely expect to see his G.I. tract on display in a museum someday, either as a revolutionary new source of natural energy or a devastatingly effective chemical weapon system.
I think the school children of tomorrow should be able to appreciate such a remarkable medical oddity, albeit in a safe and controlled environment.
Regardless, I enjoy a certain deep and abiding kinship with Walt, Krista, Scotty, and the other survivors of that momentous evening.
Like survivors of an air crash, earthquake victims, or combat-hardened Navy SEALs, I feel that we have, by triumphing in the face of this unspeakable crucible, developed a bond that transcends the boundaries of most mortal experience.
Should I be so fortunate as to bump into one of these fellow physicians 30 years hence at some professional gathering or academic symposium, we will no doubt be reduced to tears over the retelling of that timeless evening when the mysterious stranger with the hyperactive bowels rendered the entire med school library uninhabitable.
