It is always a rude shock when I feel that sudden wet warmth in the back of my pants. After twenty years of mortal existence, with all the attendant functions of a mortal body, I still can never tell if my next fart will be just a puff of effluvium--noxious but ultimately transitory--or whether it will be one of those farts.
Like restless ghosts with such burning animus that they will themselves into physical existence, some farts abandon their ethereal form for a single dreadful purpose. Namely, they exist to ruin my afternoon, not to mention a pair of perfectly good boxer-briefs.
My first memory of such an occurance was formed on the second day of pre-school, at the tender age of four. Pre-school was a confusing place, full of yellow-haired giantesses, paper-maché dinosaur eggs, and the acrid scent of Play-Doh.
It happened during recess, while I was standing in the playground. I don't remember the cause; too much breakfast perhaps--or perhaps too little. In any case, I quickly retreated into a bathroom stall. I pulled down my adorable corduroy pants, then my tighty-whities, and THERE was the tell-tale brownish orange streak. Quite small actually, but, like transistors, underwear are binary. One or zero. Soiled or unsoiled.
And mine were soiled. Even at that age, I knew they could never be worn again. Sitting on the toilet, with my pants around my ankles, all I could do was wait.
A bell rang, signaling the end of recess, and the sounds of the playground were gradually replaced by a deafening silence. My entire universe was reduced to the four walls of the bathroom stall, the cold tile floor, and my poopy pants.
I started crying--just sniffles at first, then small tears that slowly rolled out of the corners of my eyes and down my cherubic four-year old cheeks. Life sucked.
And then, in a miraculous deus ex machina, a teacher lady opened the stall, took in the situation with one look, and then sprang into action like only pre-school teacher can. She cleaned me up, and helped me change into the fresh pair of undies that all the kids at the pre-school bring with them every day, in a red plastic basket.
And then she hugged me for what must have been at least five minutes, and everything was OK.
Later on in that day, the same lady who rescued me led a lesson on sea creatures, and taught me about the fearsome "Great White Sock." It was one of the first English phrases I ever learned.
When my mom picked me up that afternoon, and as we drove past the eucalyptus trees that line half the streets in Irvine, I still thought the day had been pretty horrible. It is only with the special perspective (or revisionism) that comes with age that I saw something more in that day. During my year at pre-school, I learned plenty of vocabulary and simple grammar. But there are other ways speak than with words, and in the end, it was that hug on the second day, from a complete stranger, that said the most.
