The gas we pass

While I was serving a mission for the LDS church I struggled in the beginning with the language. I remember working so hard to speak Spanish, and understand what was going on around me that I would often be exhausted from the effort. On one particularly tiring day I was sitting in a small home in Tacuarembo, Uruguay listening to my missionary companion go on about the finer points of the gospel. The people we were talking to were so sincere and really wanted to hear what we had to say, we were in the midst of helping the husband stop smoking and things seemed to be going pretty well until I found myself in a desperate situation: I could not keep my eyes open. I bit my tongue, dug my fingers into my leg, tightened my stomach muscles, nothing was working, sleep was looming over me like an indefatigable foe. Finally I issued a desperate plea to God in my mind "Heavenly Father please, I don't care how you do it, just don't let me fall asleep". What happened next proves to me that God has a sense of humor. All of the sudden, with out any warning, I let out a HUGE fart. Not just a blip that could be disguised as a household creak, but a BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRPPPPPPP unmistakenly emerging from the innermost part of my being, roaring forth to bring this lowly mortal to a completely awake state. I looked at my companion in horror and she tried to hold in the laughter until tears came to her eyes. It was either cry or laugh with her so we both lost it. Well, consider that a prayer answered. There was no way I was falling asleep after that.

When I was little my Dad would yell at us if we used what he called "bathroom humor" and would tell us to "stop talking about the bodily functions!" This coming from a man that, while having dinner with Jeff for the first time (a week before our wedding) he calmly leaned to the side and let a yeeerrrrrp poof out from ye ol' cheeks. He didn't miss a step. He merely paused, rocked to one side, let fly and put the next forkful of steamed broccoli in his mouth as if to say "That's right I was flatulent. Just letting you know my constitution is ready for action". We couldn't use the slang words "poo" and "pee" or even number 1 or 2 when we had to go. Just imagine a three year old Amy saying "Daddy I gotta go".

To which the response is "Defecate or urinate?".

"Um, urminate?".

"Close enough, off you go".

Heaven help us if we ever used the word fart. I don't even think it had a sanctioned name. You just did it and didn't talk about it. But let's face it. The "bodily functions" are and always will be funny. In fact if either one of us lets fly in the car (oh, come on! you've done it). We always tell each other "Share it with the world" which really means "Holy crap that smells like raw sewage, roll down the windows before we give our kid brain damage". My sister said whenever she farts her husband leans over, inhales deeply and says "I love your scent". Now that's funny. Come to think of it, several of my sister's husbands have nicknames that call to mind our family legacy of a healthy, active colon: Fartania, Farticia, Princess Rumbleseat and Stinkles.

So let's just accept the fact that anything that naturally comes from the body is funny and be done with it (except maybe pus, that's just gross, nothing funny about it.). You can bet I'll keep blogging about it too. It's just the gift that keeps on giving.