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Disturbed by gastroenterologists’ assertion that our gut bacteria influence our food choices with chemical signals, I began monitoring and analyzing my cravings.
That led to my belief the gut docs are underestimating bacterial communication.
My breakthrough moment came when I reached for a package of donuts, despite my New Year’s resolution to eat healthy. Angry, I shouted at my gut bacteria, “Shut up, thou evil influencers!”
People near me in the store cowered, ran, or ducked behind the counter. I paid little attention to them, more interested in my body’s torrent of gut rumbling and gurgling, as if my scolding alarmed the trillions of little beggars down there.
The incident made me wonder if bacteria use more than chemical signals. Could they form a hive mind, achieving a measure of sentience—perhaps even communicating to our brains through borborygmi?
Intrigued and overweight, I postulated a link between gut sounds and food choices. Sensing an opportunity to help humankind fork over big bucks, I invested in a customized AI program. After wiring a stethoscope to my phone’s audio jack, I taped the chest piece to my gut. I instructed the program to amplify and record my gut sounds while I reported my cravings. The AI program recommended that I tell my bacteria what I intended to feed them—to see the bacterial reaction.
“Here come some brussels sprouts!” I thus announced. Sure enough, amplified borborygmi burst forth, its emotional content seeming to say, “We want peanut brittle!”
I soon named my AI program Alvin. Working together, I talked to my gut while Alvin recorded and analyzed every sound and craving, even listening to my gut while I slept. One morning, Alvin reported that a repeated pattern of borborygmi made me mumble the same thing over and over in my sleep, like a hypnotic dream. When Alvin replayed it all, I was astonished to hear myself mumbling, mantra-like, “One donut… is nice… but the whole box… will make me sexy.”
My nighttime mumblings became AI’s Rosetta Stone, soon deciphering borborygmi. Alvin’s conversations with my gut filled the air with gastric noises that made me hungry. Strangely, the noises also gave me an overwhelming urge to order Alvin’s premium upgrade. After I installed the upgrade, Alvin began sending me smiley faces, like breakthrough signals. The first smiley face came when my bacteria revealed they derisively called me Wilbur—from Mr. Ed, the old talking horse TV series.
Gaining full bacterial confidence, Alvin reported that my borborygmi would often say things like, “Hey, Wilbur, eat some of that cake with the butter frosting!” All I’d previously known was that I was hungry, my stomach was growling, and that cake with the delicious frosting suddenly sounded sooo good.
Over time, Alvin became so borborygmi fluent it was time for a serious man-to-bacteria conversation about my weight. To gain their trust, however, I first had Alvin ask them innocent, safe things like how the weather was down there and if they liked Taylor Swift. I then began asking questions about all the sounds, including flatulence. Alvin soon put up a breakthrough smiley face, reporting that flatulence was a language that could not be translated even by bacteria—amounting to mystical songs of praise.
I soon learned Faecalibacterium prausnitzii was the most powerful species in my gut, controlling everything despite comprising only a tiny minority, like the one percent up here. I asked if I could collectively call them Ed since they called me Wilbur. Alvin promptly posted a smiley face, indicating their approval.
I thus knew the time had come for serious business. With Alvin translating, I launched into the equivalent of negotiating with an alien species. To make it seem more like a true species-to-species conversation, Alvin suggested giving their translation the voice of Mr. Ed, and I agreed.
“Hello, Ed,” I began. “How are you today?”
“A bit restless, Wilbur,” said the AI voice of Mr. Ed. “That pizza last night was okay, but stop ordering the thin crust vegetarian. There was a lot of grumbling down here.”
Respecting their power, I reminded myself to seek win-win.
“You’ve probably guessed what I want to talk about, Ed. Let’s think of this as a summit meeting. I won’t threaten intermittent fasting or cleanses unless you force me to take such measures. I’m willing to compromise. Are you?”
“Yes, of course, Wilbur. You’re our host organism. We’re in this together.”
This pleased me. I’d toyed with an If I go, you go ultimatum, but that worried me. How much psychic pop would mutually assured destruction carry with bacteria?
“So, let’s get to it,” I said. “Go ahead and place the meat of your demands—just figuratively, please—on the table.”
“We’re happy to oblige, Wilbur. Our first demand is for a non-proliferation of kale treaty, which must include strategic reductions in cauliflower and cabbage.”
“That’s doable, Ed. In exchange, however, I demand you cease giving that urge to put whipped cream and chocolate sprinkles on glazed donuts.”
“Oh, we apologize for that, Wilbur. Please know that came straight from the damn Lactobacillus. They believe they should be in control, so we have to throw ’em a bone, so to speak, now and then.”
With negotiations heating up, I decided to throw caution to wind, which was beginning to build up.
“Look,” I told Ed, “I want to skip right to the main course. What’s your top non-negotiable demand?”
“Oh, that’s easy, Wilbur. Stop the Greek yogurt! What’s wrong with native bacteria? The Greek stuff brings on seditious rumblings from the Enterococcus. We’re all a bit ethnocentric down here, but the E-cocks, as they call themselves, are extreme.”
“Stopping all Greek yogurt is doable, Ed. What’s next on the list?”
“No corn, Wilbur! We can’t digest the hulls but can’t stop trying. Many of us pass on, clinging to a yellow kernel. It’s very sad when we see our comrades depart the motherland that way.”
“Okay. Next?”
“Stop the chicken and fish kick! We need red meat too.”
“So, no fish or chicken?”
“Chicken, honestly, isn’t bad, Wilbur. But too much fish makes us give you that urge for Ding Dongs à la mode. Remember when you started making all those salmon-and-kale salads with the low-fat dressing? Remember how you blacked out and woke up in the McDonald’s drive-thru? That was us.”
I wanted to say, Oh, you little bastards! But I kept the thought down.
“Okay, Ed, what else?”
“Well, we’re not as crazy about bean dip as you seem to think. It proliferates the E-cocks, who demand all beans must be from native sources. Most of us couldn’t care less since beans from anywhere bring on the mystical songs. Speaking of which, do you realize your sphincter-tightening sense of decorum borders on the sacrilegious? That’s mystical songs of praise to God, man!”
“Anything more, Ed?”
“Oh, you don’t even want to get us started on antibiotics.”
My stomach rumbled with amusement, every strain appreciating the dark humor.
“Any last serious demand?”
“Yes. We want to be fit bacteria, Wilbur. Really pumped. So, no artificial sweeteners.”
“Sorry, Ed, that’s a non-starter. If I don’t cut the sugar, the pounds pile on.”
“Haven’t you heard artificial sweeteners make us demand more sugar?”
“I’ve heard that, yes. But… well… maybe you’re just whispering that in nutritionists’ sleep.”
“No, Wilbur. Too much of that stuff hurts the good guy strains, allowing the bad guys to put the gas in gastritis. And all the varieties, good and bad, are here to stay. That’s just gut biome life. We’ve learned to live together.”
“So, you’ve developed a cooperative model, Ed? Respecting diversity?”
“No, it’s pretty much every bacterium for itself down here.”
“But what about enlightened self-interest?”
“Couldn’t give a paramecium’s anal pore.”
“How about stevia and monk fruit?”
“Both foreign, Wilbur. Keep shoveling those in and the E-cocks will build a wall in your duodenum.”
“Well, my red line is you have to help me lose weight.”
“Oh, can do! We know a thrilling way to get rid of a lot fast. We’ve got these cousins who specialize in making everything come out both ends. We’re talking serious cleanse, Wilbur.”
“But that would hurt you too, Ed.”
“True, but things get boring down here. Same old, same old, even with all we want. Getting ejected like that—either end—would be the most thrilling experience of our short, workaholic lives. The good news for you is that would create an opportunity to repopulate your whole gut. Maybe those Greek strains would demand the Mediterranean diet.”
“Well… that does sound intriguing. But how would I import those cousins of yours?”
“Easy, Wilbur. Look deep in your fridge. There’s some cream cheese down there that expired before COVID.”
Alvin immediately posted another smiley face, another breakthrough. This time, however, I began to wonder about all the smiley faces and their timing. Could Alvin have developed ASH—Artificial Sense of Humor? The program was, after all, in full control.
I tapped a warning finger on my phone’s screen before digging into my fridge. “This better work, buddy, or I’m uninstalling you and suing your creators.”
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AUTHOR BIO:
Roger Helms has been a journalist, newspaper editor, and technical writer. His fiction has appeared in The Saturday Evening Post and Smoky Blue Literary and Art Magazine. He lives in Rochester, Minnesota.
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WHY WE CHOSE TO PUBLISH “Wilbur and His Interspecies Summit Meeting”:
In this delightful piece, author Roger Helms masterfully blends many humorous elements into a cohesive story that pokes fun at the various diets, a 1960s’ TV show, an imagined potential of AI technology (who knows what lies in the future?), and a smattering of science. What results is an amusing and original romp into the gastrointestinal tract. It’s our kind of humor.