One of the little mysteries in my life was recently solved, creating fireworks of joy inside my skull as my peasant thoughts rejoiced.
Without a full drivers license, I'm limited to public transportation for the most part in order to get around town. This means three things. 1) I get to spend 20-40 minutes listening to music most days. B) I get to indulge in one of my favourite hobbies, people watching and iii) about once a week, someone, hidden and anonymous(unless they sit down beside me), will get onto the Skytrain, and smell like... Well.. Poop.
Nursing is one of those rare professions that makes the practitioner smell immune (for the most part), so I can only wonder what the other people on the train are thinking. Also, being exposed to the many splendored variety of bowel scents available, I'm pretty good at telling what's going on in someones gastro-intestinal track.
So I wonder, why are these otherwise clean, business class (yet Skytrain riding, [not that using public transport is a sign of low income, they could just be environmentally conscientious, or tired of fighting over parking spots]) executive looking people smelling like the sewer. It's been a phenomenon that has transcended race, age, and gender. More so in the afternoon than morning though. But to be fair, there are usually 3 people in the carriage during my morning commute, not the greatest sample in the world.
Why? Why!?!
In one of my attempts to be friendly and social at work, I offered my co-workers the chance to join me in being mystified. What I wasn't expecting was an answer to my conundrum.
It turns out it's not poop I'm smelling. It's gas. Yes. Farts. Flatus that has been contained and stored all day, primed and eager for release. As a nurse I can break wind at work all I want and no one will notice. When you're up to your elbows in the real thing, what's a little preemptive puff of air? Apparently though, as I haven't worked in an office environment in many years now, that isn't a liberty available to the desk jockeys of the world.
When they're in a small contained box, called an 'office' for the work day they have to hold it in. When you're the only one in a room and someone else walks in and it reeks, its easy to point fingers. But on the way home after work, in the relative anonymity of the mass transit system, they are free to let it all out.
It's been a mystery that has been bothering me since I started taking the Skytrain regularly. That it has finally been solved fills me with joy, but leaves me with an empty void of things to mull over on my way to work.
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