Days of the Locust

Some synonyms for “squeamish” may surprise you: scrupulous, principled, honorable, upright. These come to me as a pleasant surprise since I am known for my squeamishness and ashamed of it.  But I cannot claim the high-mindedness those words suggest. The synonyms for my kind of squeamish run along the lines of paranoid, phobic, selfish, suspicious, and, at best, commonsensical. Among the things that make my skin crawl: warm subway poles, warm telephone receivers, warm toilet seats, warm drinking water, drinking water with ice, iPhones with smeared or cracked screens, a human sharing a tub of cottage cheese with a cat, a human sharing food from a plate with another human, leftovers of any kind but particularly Chinese takeout. And then there are the things that make everybody recoil but induce a more severe, phobic response in me: lice, ticks, mosquitoes, bedbugs, the odor of mildew. Paradoxically, I’m comfortable changing soiled diapers on the young or old, but dog shit on my ...

I have a dear little friend, now 3 years old, with whom I’ve been having playdates throughout her lifetime. About six months ago, I had a troubling moment. I was changing little P’s pull-ups, and she was wriggling on the changing table. To entertain her as I cleaned her up, I started lifting her shirt and tickling her tummy. The first time I did it, she screamed (with what sounded like delight) and laughed. When I lifted her shirt to tickle her again a few seconds later, she screamed and laughed again—and yelled “No!” She seemed to love this game, and I continued to do it till I got her dressed and took her off the table. She ran off giggling and squealing “No!” She seemed to want me to play some more. Then suddenly the “No means no!” slogan flashed through my mind. And I stopped right there. Looking back, I’ve wondered about this moment. And I’ve finally come to a conclusion. Even when a little girl who’s having fun says no as part of a game, I’m thinking it’s a pretty good idea...

Hardcovers--why do people feel they're superior to paperbacks and e-books? I hate them. They're too heavy and bulky to carry in your purse, so you never have them with you when you want them. Their bindings are stiff, and the pages don't open fully, and they're unwieldy to hold-- hard on the eyes and arms and neck and hands. Plus they're expensive. And if you buy them secondhand or borrow them from the library, they're liable to harbor mites, lice, or bedbugs. Why would anyone want such a thing--in their hands or in their house? The e-book, by contrast, is lightweight, totable, proppable, searchable, sanitary, and comfort itself to hold. And perhaps most miraculous, if you have a library card, you can hear about a book and in seconds grab it from the ether and begin to read it--before the title drops from your memory. And when you're done, you do not need to find a space to store it or remember to return it or find someone to pass it on to. It just disappe...