Before I share the following information, I must swear you to secrecy. I know; to look at me, you might think, "Hey, he seems like a guy who has it moderately together. He's got a great wife, a decent job, and one day in about 2033, his house will be paid off. He's living the American dream." I do, however, have a deep, dark secret. I have what biologists might call overactive intestinal flora. In layman's terms, that means I typically have gas that could knock flies off of cow patties. In fact, I would go so far as to say that my intestinal flora is more like fauna; dead, festering road kill, to be precise.

I have been this way for as long as I can remember. Indeed, one of my first self-aware moments came by way of the foul air biscuit. At the tender age of two, whilst waiting for my mother to get dressed, I stood innocently by the bedroom door, no doubt clutching a fluffy blanket or some favorite toy, when suddenly my pants rumbled audibly.

"Who dat?" I inquired with genuine surprise, wondering where this intriguing new sound had come from. This would mark the beginning of my lifelong association with the stank cloud. When a boy is anywhere between the ages of three and eleven or twelve, farts are quite possibly some of the most creative and inexpensive fun he can have. Any grouping of two or more boys can easily turn into a contest in which sound, odor, and audible duration of a single sphinctal expulsion will be judged and debated with the same seriousness as the theories of creationism and evolution at the Scope's Monkey trial. A boy could win by default if he could make any other contestants puke.

When a boy reaches adolescence, he will soon discover, however, that audible flatulence ranks only second to random erections on the list of things that will make him very uncomfortable around the opposite sex. However, amongst only his male peers, passing gas remains as enjoyable and entertaining as it always was. I'm sure at one point, nearly everyone has heard the urban legend that farts are flammable. Thanks to my high school classmate Mike, a twelve pack of Keystone, and a ninety-nine cent Bic lighter, I can reliably attest that this not an urban legend. Mike's flame was legendary, maybe, but definitely not an urban legend. I am also reasonably sure Mike is not the only living male to put this theory to the test. Indeed, had Laboulaye, Bartholdi, and Eiffel been drunken frat brothers instead of the freedom loving blood brothers of our founding fathers, the Statue of Liberty may have very well been modeled after a man in his early twenties, precariously balanced on his neck and shoulders, clutching his legs with one hand, and holding a flaming torch over his glory hole with the other. Fortunately, for all Americans, especially New Yorkers, Bartholdi chose to immortalize his mother Charlotte instead.

I would love to say that when boys become men, that these juvenile fascinations will eventually cease. I would love to say it, but that doesn't necessarily make it so. After graduating college, I went to Oklahoma City to train for my first post-school, productive member of society job. It just so happened that a co-trainee, Jeff, had graduated from the same college as I had and was married to one of my high school classmates. Typically, after training, three or four of us trainees would go out to a sports bar, watch the NBA playoffs that were currently in progress, and chow down. Jeff would often volunteer to drive. As it turned out, Jeff took great joy in locking out the individual power window controls of his car, silently breaking wind, and then quickly asking whether any one smelled anything burning before the odor profile of his lower colon had become common knowledge. When asked this question, one will invariably breathe in deeply through the nose to ascertain his opinion on the subject recently "floated" for discussion. As you may be well aware, smell is a major proponent of taste. Now both smelling and tasting the fouled air in our one hundred cubic foot hell, we were frantically trying to roll our windows down, barfing in our mouths a little, and hurling copious obscene epithets at our evil benefactor. Of course we were all also silently contemplating the purchase of a vehicle with power windows and trying to remember the exact wording of Jeff's question.

At some point in his life, though, a man needs to put away these childish things and grow up...... just long enough to find some poor, unsuspecting woman to marry him. One of the number one causes of marriage is gas. A man will eventually reach the point where he does not want to hold it anymore. It will start innocently enough. A timid poot here and there, followed by an embarrassed begging of pardon. From there, it is a short, steep, slippery slope to "Honey, you want to smell something that will make your nose secede from your face?" Ladies, if you've never heard of the Dutch oven, you soon will. It's just a matter of time. He will claim it was an accident, but you'll know the score.

The only thing known to reliably keep a man from farting is irritable bowel syndrome and one or two momentary lapses of sphincter control. As a man ages, he will invariably be heard to utter the following phrase with greater and greater frequency: "I hope that was a fart." Unfortunately, most of us men are not smart enough to stay away from food stuffs that provoke our spastic colons. We will instead do intelligent things like categorizing our smells. "That one there, that was my garlic toot. Yesterday, those were steak toots. Heaven help you if I get the beer toots."

I am currently conducting a literary experiment that includes me going vegetarian for one year. I had hoped the advent of an exercise program and a healthy diet would decrease the extent of my foulness. I have discovered that a diet replete with fruits, vegetables grains, and legumes has changed only the smells and not the delivery. My one last hope was the miracle of modern science. The result: welcome to the list.... The Beano fart and the Gas-X fart. I guess I am what I am. If you see me, leave a wide berth. I'll be the one standing alone with the goofy grin.