The Existential Sneeze

Today, in the check out line at Barnes and Nobles I sneezed. I knew from conception, at that first little kick in my sinuses, that this was not going to be a small sneeze. This is something that I've dealt with my entire life. I'm a relatively small person, 5'2, one hundred and smee-smee pounds, but every once in a while, maybe two to three times a year, I'll defy scientific possibility and let out a sneeze much bigger than myself. A real fee-fie-foe-fum, celestial body-shifting sneeze.

This particular sneeze was going to be just that. I could tell. I tried to convince myself that I didn't need to sneeze. That it was just a false alarm. But I knew I was doomed when I started taking involuntary shallow breaths. So I held onto the books I was going to buy for dear life, spread my feet further apart, and bent my knees for balance.

And then it happened.

My least favorite part about these sneezes are the silences that always follow. Everyone stops what they are doing to look around and try to figure out where the gigantic sub-human monster is that could make such a horrible racket. And sure enough, the grandmother in front of me and her tiny frightened grandchild turned around, the middle-aged man that was talking to his wife on his cell-phone about what they were going to do for dinner stopped mid sentence. Even the cashiers stopped in the middle of trying to sign their customers up for the membership club to peer down in my direction.

I've discovered that the best way to deal with these situations is to pretend that they are completely normal. So I put on an unconcerned face to prove to everyone that none of my vital organs had shifted or collided, and mumbled a completely indifferent "Excuse me." It usually takes about five to ten seconds for everything to return to normal. I understand this and I try not to get frustrated. I can tell people are still trying to make sense of what just happened. They are trying to recall the sound that they just heard, and reconcile it with the fact that it came from me. It's the same sensation that anybody has when they hear a sound that may indicate some serious and direct threat to their personal well-being, like a sonic boom or gunshot. It takes them a few seconds to recover and realize that they are still in a safe place. Everything was about to return to normal, cashiers were signing up members, the guy behind me was suggesting Thai food, people were rebuilding, when the kid in front of me ruined it. He was still staring up at me in the honest and rude way that kids will do. I noticed he was staring at my right sleeve, where I had deposited my sneeze (as all the scary H1N1 flyers have instructed me to do). This stupid effing kid ruined everything.

"Ewww. Look Grandma. She's got boogers on her arm." His high pitched voice no doubt carried as far as the cafe where the trendy barista steaming milk to 160 degrees could hear him. He pointed up to my right arm where a giant pile of snot, the good stuff that screams, "You need a Z-Pack, stat!" was congealing. The man on the cell phone told his wife to hold on, and he stepped around me so he could get a better view. I looked at the amoeba shaped puddle with the approximate diameter of a 50 cent piece, that was highlighted by the black fabric of my sweater, and then I looked up at the disgusted faces of these three strangers, feeling the most vulnerable I had since my last visit to the OBGYN. I had been forced to share something with these three strangers that I never would have shared with them by choice.

I had no idea what to do with the snot-corpse. I couldn't just wipe it off because then I would literally have a hand-full of snot. I thought for a second about taking my sweater off and then I remembered I had thrown this sweater on over my pajama shirt that advertised me as a member of the Midget Brothel (long story that begins with "When I was in college...") and it had my name on the back of it. These people already knew way too much about me and my bodily fluids, so there was no way I was going to let them know my name.

We all stood there for about 30 seconds staring at this massacre on my arm when the grandmother reached into her pocket-book and pulled out a travel size pack of tissues, something that all good grandmothers should carry. She took one out and handed it over to me. I somehow managed to mutter a "thank you" while I wiped the sticky mess off my sweater and put the tissue in the back pocket of jeans that would definitely be washed before I wore them again.

"Next in line please."

The woman in front of me was about to walk off to buy the stack of children's books for her grandson who she no doubt enjoyed spoiling. Before she went, she turned around and smiled real big at me and said, "God bless you." And then she was gone.

This might seem like a strange thing to write about for my first blog entry, but I realized as I was driving home, pocket full of snot, still feeling a lot embarrassed, that my resistance to blogging is very similar to what had just happened . I've always journaled, but blogging never appealed to me because it seemed like it could leave me feeling very vulnerable. You're putting your thoughts out for anybody to read (even though no one probably will...I'm hoping that blogging will make me improve the quality of writing I've been doing in my journal lately because of the chance that somebody could read it). But even if it is a mortifying experience, like sneezing your brains out onto a black sweater and having three complete strangers stare at your snot with you, there is something so human about it, too. And I've always been a fan of writing about the things about being human that can bring people together, even if it is only through embarrassment. For about 1 minute I shared something with a group of strangers that we all have in common: snot. So I'm hoping through this blog I can write about some of these experiences. And who knows, maybe I'll get a "God bless you" or two.

Plus, the truth about sneezing, especially those big soul-baring sneezes that could be responsible for the birth of a black hole, is that for a millisecond after it's happened, the sense of relief that you feel is pretty amazing. It feels pretty damn good to get it out of your system.