Fart of Disruption

Today, I was substitute teaching a seventh grade health class. The time: 1:20. The period: 8th. The mood: restless.

I was administering a test on the female vagina. It was quite an unruly class but I had managed to actually calm them down by the time tests were distributed. I gave many a warning to the class clowns I remembered from weeks, even years past. "You're not in trouble, but I'm warning you, you should move across the room to prevent talking to your friend during the test," I warned several of them, trying to split up the cheaters and authority beaters from one another.

No one budged. As I mentioned, to my surprise, the test was going rather smoothly. Talking was non-existent except kids thinking out loud about the differences between the labia majora and the clitoris.

Suddenly, from a cross the room, piercing the sound of scribbling lead and sporadic winter coughs, came one of the loudest farts I've ever heard in my life. I looked up at the class, waiting for someone to yell "OH MY GOD," which would inevitably send the class into a frenzy, ruining the test, causing a neighboring teacher to come in and yell at the kids for shouting. All the while, I'd be standing there, pride next to my shoes, proving I had no control whatsoever over managing kids and their budding minds.

The reaction, however, unfolded dramatically different than this But the fart was massive. I watched as one by one, heads lifted from their tests, looks of confusion on their faces, as if to indicate "did I just hear what I thought I heard?" Smiles began to spread, a lone chuckle from the back of the room. Then, full blown laughter, growing louder and louder.

But just as in "A Bronx Tale" I noticed one face in the back corner that looked different than the rest. This face was not smiling. Instead, it looked as if this kid was taking an embarrassed shit, face flushing a deep red, eyes cast down, cemented to his desk, quaking in his boots. The guilty party had outed it's own self.

Eventually, the laughter in class tore down the rafters. The memory of the fart was just too powerful, still hanging in the air. Our ears still rung with the rectal rumble. Kids made farting noises of their own, laughing as if each mouth-to-hand fart was funnier than the next. I warned them to shut up. And to shut up. And to shut up. Eventually, I got so annoyed, I wrote a report to the teacher telling them everyone was talking during the test, probably causing a wide spread F's or retakes.

Driving home I realized, "Oh my God. They're gonna get zeros. But that one kid is gonna get a zero on his test and have to live with the guilt of that A(nus) bomb." I wish I could go back and erase the note to the teacher, telling him to go easy on the kids tomorrow. After all, a fart is a fart is a good laugh.