Nit Picking

There's a new Scarlet Letter in town and Hester Prynne need NOT apply. (Or, if she was eligible, then the poor thing had even more problems than Hawthorne let on). No folks, we're talking about a big letter L and it's not for Loser or Lackey or Lewd. It's for Louse as in Lice as in Nits as in GROSS as in "I never thought I'd see the day when I'd be checking my child's head for bugs, because I'm not an orangutan." ((This is where my friends who have no children and thus get sleep, have sex and lead exciting lives full of "The Arts" and "Culture" and vacations and booze can stop reading. Love you guys and I'll be back soon with a blog just for VOUS.))

Now, parents, let's just be clear. My little dearies are lice-free...for the moment (don't want to jinx them). But there is an infestation - or as I like to think of it, PLAGUE of lice at their school (Doesn't paying $25K per year to have two kids in private school include a "Get Out Of Lice Free" card or something? Damn.)

The whole thing started with a vague email from the school about "lice were seen" and "lice have been found" and "beware of lice" and etc. LICE?! I immediately went online to Google the things and made the mistake of pulling up images of the creatures, which - when magnified to what I have to believe (or at least hope) is 1 million times their actual size - look like they could take on Jabba the Hut...and WIN. I started to itch immediately...

When the kids got home, my kindergartener immediately launched into a litany of what was found on each of her classmates' heads. So and so has LICE. So and so also has LICE. So and so maybe has lice, so had to go home anyway. This boy and his best friend both had Play-doh in their hair. This boy had grass in his hair (he's too young to be a loadie, so am assuming this is not THAT kind of grass) This girl had a Lego in her hair (okay, didn't buy that one!). And, Mom, I had GLITTER in my hair (of course).

For the past week, the already-overworked teachers have had to don gloves and wield popsicle stick/tongue depressor things to check every kid's hair for...gasp!...lice. It has become something of a ceremony at school. My kindergartener, a glutton for any kind of personal attention, loves the new routine and wishes they would spend MORE TIME checking her head because "it feels good, mama." Now, even the third graders are coming home with tales of who has lice, who has dandruff. (But, being more mature, they are very nice about it, as in "so and so just had a BIT of lice, mom. It's no biggie.").

Which brings me, at long-winded last, to my Scarlet Letter comparison. Even the third graders are acknowledging by their reactions to the lice epidemic that being the bearer of a louse colony upon one's head might be a bad thing. I have to admit the thought crossed my mind - What if MY kid had lice? Would that be a reflection on me? That I'm not a good mom? That I don't keep her clean enough? Use the right shampoo? That I take her to skanky places (Chuck E Cheese?)?

Of course, the answer is no, even if my kid did have lice - and I have friends whose kids' lovely locks have fallen victim to the lice plague - it would not make me a bad mom. And doesn't make them bad moms, either. It's just the luck of the draw, sweetheart. Or, maybe, just a roll of the...lice.