My Lousy Sunday

Normally I love it when my Old Man runs his fingers through my hair. Yesterday morning, as he sifted through my hair with gentle, searching fingers, I held my breath in tense anticipation. When he untangled his hands from my hair and said "there's nothing there," I breathed a mighty sigh of relief. For the rest of the day, I felt a bit elated every time I reminded myself of the fact: "I do not have head lice."

My kids, however, did have head lice. This was already an established fact. With O. we had to search and search to find a critter that confirmed what we'd feared ever since we got the news that one of his little buddies had cooties. When we finally found something, we all had to hold still to ascertain that, yes, the little white fleck was actually moving. It must have been a young one, because when we went to check Roo, her hair was positively alive with unmistakable bugs, gray and crawling, little legs clearly visible.

Am I grossing you out yet?

So we spent the morning giving our kids insecticide shampoos, engaging in some literal nitpicking, and washing load after load of laundry with hot water. It was not pleasant. O. was heroic in his acceptance of the stinging shampoo, the fact that we had to leave it in for ten minutes during which he couldn't move much or touch his head, and the fact that we had to rinse the thick, goopy shit out for what seemed like another ten minutes to finally get rid of it. Two-year-old Roo was less understanding. Finally I just had to resign myself to the fact that she was going to cry in a most heart-rending manner the whole time. During the nitpicking part we got her to stop for awhile by allowing her to eat an unlimited quantity of Elmo cookies. It was a trial.

Even though I've been cleared by my resident nit-checker (after three separate checks), my head still itches like hell. And I have a whole new appreciation for the gravity of the word lousy.