Bugs bugs bugs.
Bugs bugs bugs.
I am done with bugs. But I'm now part of the club, I'm told, because it seems everyone has a head lice story of their own. I'm so over it and the 40 loads of laundry I've done in the last two weeks, but there are a few points worth mentioning.
1) I am far more neurotic and alarmist than my kids. They were so chilled about the whole thing. I mean, after I came home from the pediatrician upon finding out that my son did not, indeed, have some summer dry scalp condition (You see the dandruff didn't shake off, it hung on to his hair. Hint #1: Dandruff flakes drop, nits hang on.) I doused myself and my kids with some toxic over-the-counter potion that can give pregnant lab mice two-headed children in large doses. I left the poisen on too long, then combed out their hair. After that I did as my pediatrican recommended and coated their hair with vaseline, which made them both look as though they were wearing the fur of dirty Pomeranian puppies on their heads. They pointed and laughed at each other, especially after I pulled the pink shower caps on them before bed. Then came the first couple dozen loads of laundry, which was also fun for the kids because with too many loads my washer was overwhelmed and we had to go to the corner laundromat. Good times, since the place is lined with quarter toy machines and video games. Just like Chuck-E-Cheese, only with front-loading industrial washing machines. Then, to be on the safe side and because I was so completely grossed out, we all went to some pricey West Side salon that specializes in the buggers. Seriously, specializes. And the place was PACKED. With kids and parents waiting for their turn with The Hair Fairies. Kids from exclusive private schools, charter schools, public schools... an entire slumber party...a wrestling team, baseball team...you name it. I parked my ten year old SUV and walked past a woman getting out of her brand new Mercedes S class, dressed in Christian Dior in the middle of the freakin' day, with two perfectly uniformed girls in pressed shorts. I could only wonder where they were heading. Shopping, then lunch at the Ivy? Breakfast, then tennis lessons at a nearby country club? I leapt up the stairs to the Hair Fairy Salon (yes, that is their name, I shit you not) and guess who appeared 30 seconds behind me? Yup. Lady Christian Dior and kids, seeming as nonchalont as I would have liked to seemed. The slumber party of thirteen-year old girls from Brentwood? They were cheerfully comparing their bugs and nits as in "Hey, Emily, I had 32 nits and 3 live bugs!" "Well, guess what, I had 40 nits and 4 bugs!" They laughed and ate the Tootsie Pops that the good fairies provided.
2) Everyone can get lice. Lice do not discriminate. I am happy to report that they are pure liberal/equal opportunity pests
3) Your good friends are honestly unconcerned and far less freaked out than you are that your kids have lice and will not run to your house and brand you and your children with scarlet L's. Mine didn't, because I discovered that they are far cooler than I, Gunga Din. Everybody knows someone who's brought the buggers home, or brought the buggers home themselves, or has the lice visitation story to beat your lice visitation story.
But I am done now. And like everything else in childhood, this will soon be one of those memories that I will be able to look back on and, yes, laugh at. Because it is not earth-shattering. I reserve that that term for earthquakes and loss and destruction. That is what I need remember, always, because the kids are still laughing at me, and how 'freaked out mommy got'. And I think how lucky I am.
Goodnight. Sleep tight. Don't let the bed bugs bite. --K
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