I’ll show you mine if you show me – nah, nevermind. I’ll just show you mine

Many people love to talk about gross or embarrassing things that happen to others around them. Some people enjoy telling mortifying things about themselves. I am usually the first one to trade a kidney or a child in exchange for a witness’ eternal silence about whatever embarrassing thing they are privy to me doing. But sadly, and predictably so, I have run out of kidneys and the children keep being returned to my care, so onward to Plan B. Plan B is the one where I just start coming clean with all of the embarrassing, mortifying or stupid things that I say, do or happen upon thereby freeing myself from the constant agony, shame, humiliation and guilt that inevitably plague me whenever I try to keep secrets greater than say, who shot J.R. (Spoiler alert! It was all a dream sequence. Ugh. See, I told you, I’m an asshole at keeping secrets.

I may have mentioned once or a dozen times that I work with kids every day throughout Keswick and Georgina. And I’m not sure if you realize this or not, but kids breed disease and germs. They are as expert at spreading those germs around as a seasoned ecstasy dealer at a high school prom. And no amount of hand washing will fend them off once they’ve got you in their clutches.

So, about two weeks ago, a third, fourth, tenth notice came home that said, “Your child may have been exposed to head lice. Burn down your house.” (Or something along those lines, I a little bit blacked out after seeing the word ‘lice’). Since I work at both my kids’ schools, I was able to figure out fairly quickly who had ‘exposed’ my child to this infestation and also that my children remained unaffected. I, on the other hand, could not stop scratching my head. In fact, just writing about this now, my head is itchy and I have to keep stopping typing to either scratch my head or talk myself out of throwing myself out the window.

I examined my hair and scalp in multiple mirrors. Nothing. I bought tea tree oil shampoo, conditioner and oil. And used it. Twice, as directed. My nausea and dread were only getting worse. I couldn’t ask anyone I knew to check my head because, well, EWWWW! I considered going to a walk-in clinic and asking the doctor to check. But that seemed excessive and wasteful of our healthcare dollars. So, I sat, scratched and suffered in silence. I changed pillowcases, washed everything that had been near my head in the past week and used the dryer for good measure.

Then, I snapped. In Wal-mart of all places, I screwed up my last ounce of courage, checked my pride and dignity at the door and walked into the hair cutting place in the front of the store. This was my graceful delivery:

“Um, hi. Yeah. So, I’m not sure what to say, but I work in a few schools. And um, yeah. I really don’t know what I’m doing here. I’m sorry. My head is itchy. And we keep getting these notices home about, you know, and I don’t know what to do anymore.” (Eye contact would have been a nice touch here, but I was busy concentrating all of my energy on trying to bore a hole through the floor beneath my feet so that I could disappear, never to be seen again. Spoiler alert: It didn’t happen).

The hairdresser on duty overlooked my stumbling, inarticulate and awkward speech and said, “I can check your head if you’d like?” I have never been so tempted to kiss a stranger before in my whole life. If I had one left to give, I’d have totally handed over a kidney. I sat down in the chair and she started looking through my hair. AND SHE DIDN’T FIND ANY BEASTIES!

Turns out, my hair and scalp were perfectly healthy and free from creepy-crawlers. It turned out that my brain really is the biggest defect of my headular (not a word, but should be, so I’m inventing it now) area. Confirming that I am a certifiable, delusional half-wit, for some reason, is so much easier than dealing with the idea of head lice taking up residence in my hair.

And that truth probably just further reinforces the self-diagnosis of mental instability with a side of obsessive compulsive delusions and a dollop of Pediculophobia. So, if you see a woman darting into a hair salon and bounding out moments later (without any visible difference in her hair style), there is a good chance that you’ll have just witnessed my self-prescribed mental health check in action. And for the first time, I’m thankful that we have a lot of hair salons in the ‘wick. 😉 Mental health is just a lice check away for me these days.

And that, my friends, is the first of many ‘confessions’ I will likely make going forward. Now, if you’ll excuse me, there’s a barber chair out there just waiting for me and my crazy-ass self to settle in for a nice, relaxing head-check.