Burping

I don’t burp. I couldn’t burp when I was a baby, and I never really have since. Or at least, I thought I didn’t, until I read this. I realized I do burp sometimes, a little bit. But I’ve never had one of those big, loud burps that teenage boys are constantly demonstrating. I have tried, but it’s just not something I’m able to do.

However, it’s never occurred to me to bring this up with a doctor or to attempt to resolve this discomfort in any way. I don’t actually even notice it that much. I recall at some point talking to a friend of mine who had lactose intolerance about her constant bloating which led to her self-diagnosis, and it only just occurred to me while she was talking that being painfully bloated all the time wasn’t just…what being a person feels like.

I come from a relatively stoic line of people who don’t really believe in being happy or comfortable, and I’ve very much internalized that. I’m constantly realizing that some type of misery or other that I simply live with is something that other people actively seek to alleviate. Sometimes I find myself feeling a little resentful about it, like a Boomer dad. “Why do you think you’re so special that you need to feel good and enjoy your life?” I’ll bark aloud, alone, in my office, at my Twitter feed. Since I manage other people, this can cause some problems with my empathy. This is probably by design — the stolidity of my ancestors was bred of the demands of capitalism. We are all very good employees.

I seem to have wandered a bit from the point.

Anyway, I can’t really burp and apparently there’s a cure for this. But I probably won’t bother with it; I have other more significant health problems I’m ignoring that I would likely tackle first, if I were ever to start taking care of myself, which I won’t. If I started trying to fix shit like this, where would it all end? I mean, there’s always some other thing that could work better, and I don’t want to spend all my time tinkering with my aging cage like it’s an antique car or something. It’s fine, farting is fine.