Graphic! Not for the Squeamish!

When I work at the school, I'm usually sitting at short, long tables, surrounded by tiny people. We sit close together, knees and shoulders sometimes touching, I lean towards them, watching as they touch each word on the pages of the book. We are definitely sharing air space. I hand them the pencils and books and gather them back at the end of our group time. I touch things that they touch. I feel the kids breathe on me, and more then once, I have been coughed on. Some days, I think I should be getting hazard pay.

I quickly became very matter-of-fact about telling kids to go blow their noses, if I heard them sniffle more than once.

"And wash your hands with soap and hot water. I want to be able to smell the liquid Dial when you come back."

I also wash my own hands frequently and try not to breathe in their air. Knock on wood, I have stayed fairly healthy, so either I've built up a bit of immunity, or my precautions are working.

I was helping in Kindergarten today, quizzing those 5 year olds on letters. I called a cute little boy over, and when he sat down next to me I could see he had a little something working its way out of his nose. I cringed and tried not to physically recoil. It was bad. Gooey and green and grey.

He was aware of it only as much as that he kept sticking his tongue out and up towards his nose. Thankfully, his tongue wasn't long enough to reach it, but then he started sniffing and twitching. It was driving him crazy. Polite little guy, he knew that he shouldn't pick his nose in front of me.

He is five. I couldn't just send him off to get a tissue and take care of it on his own. He could make it worse. I also had a hard time turning over bathroom responsibilities to my own boys for this same reason. Could I just ignore it? Not with the darting tongue and sniffing. As it was, I could barely concentrate on the letters he was saying. I can handle the boogers of my own kids just fine, but this kid was a stranger to me.

I considered just sending him back to class and exchanging him for a less snotty child. But something (my conscience?) held me back, and gave me a talkin' to.

"You're a mother, you should have compassion towards all children, and should wipe whatever needs wiping. Help that boy."

"Yeah, but..."

"Suck it up and grab a tissue. Do it!"

My conscience is tough.

I got the tissue, 2 ply x 3 = 6 layers of protection against that grossness. I wiped, corkscrewed, and pronounced him clean.

For good measure, we both washed our hands. Me, twice.

Would you have wiped? Or wimped?