2009: I saved the best for last

Years are full of memories. Memories are full of people. People are full of shit. Shit is heralded by farts: some clear and crisp, others murky and wet. Yeah, everyone farts, but not like this.
Some people, mainly guys, keep a mental account of flatulence. Much like the broken winds themselves the tales of past gas billow and grow from a bearly audible tuft to a thunderous clap.
 
I’m a large man and farting has always been a point of pride for my masculinity. It’s not just clearing a room or cracking one so loud that the person next to me complains about ringing in his/her ear, but the uncontrollable nature of gas. Any art has an untamed quality to it; a life of its own, which allows a given work grow to fruition of its own volition. And through this untamed magnificence an artist can produce more masterful works of art than he/she could create with all forces under his/her full control. Such is the case with my greatest fart of 2009.
 
December 27, 2009 — It was mid-afternoon at Best Buy in Sunbury PA, the town my parents moved to when I graduated from college, I had returned two duplicate presents and was browsing for a replacement. The Wii aisle of the video game section was packed with mothers tethered to their children as they endlessly searched for the best way to spend their gift card. I had just shoved my way into the fray when a ninja slipped from my anus.
 
Born and spread in a deadly silence, the odor assaulted my fellow shoppers. A few people groaned as the smelly shurikens struck their nostrils. Mothers grabbed their children and dragged them from the video game section. One mother with a particularly stubborn child actually picked her brat up and carried him under her arm; his little legs twitching in a methane fuelled delirium. This wasn’t the dull reek you’d find in a sewage treatment plant or port-a-potty. This gas was actively offensive. Days of meats, sweets, and egg nog (so much egg nog) had been processed into a biologic weapon: I’ve never smelled Sarin gas, but I’d assume it’s pleasant by comparison.
 
Like Dr. Frankenstein, I was torn between acting out in revolt and claiming my beautiful, perfect monster. Instead I stifled a laugh, abandoned the Wii games, and went to browse DVDs. But here is the beautiful thing about ninjas- they’re too funny to be kept quiet.