I Am Doomed

Pardon me if this post has even more typographical errors than usual. My hands are slippery, and they might be sliding off the laptop keys.

I am into my cold-and-flu season routine of hand-washing/hand-lotioning/hand-sanitizing/hand-lotioning/repeat/repeat/repeat/repeat/ad nauseum. Or rather, repeat/repeat/repeat and in hope of no nauseum.

Yes, indeed. I am that annoying person who watches the spray from your uncontained sneeze with equally uncontained horror. I am the one pulling her sleeves over her hands before grasping doorknobs, and the one who actually wipes off the grocery cart handle before shopping.

Am I a germophobe? Most definitely not, as my experience growing up on a farm, serving in the Peace Corps, and raising four sons testifies. I enthusiastically embrace the five-second rule and have been known to wipe a dropped pacifier on my shirt before sticking it back into a baby son's mouth.

But, people, may I respectfully posit that this flu season is bringing out the very worst in people, and that by "very worst" I mean deadly flu germs.

A case in point was my Sunday experience. (A disclaimer: I love my church congregation as if they were my family, but this case at which I'm pointing felt like the most bizarre family reunion ever and I've been to some bizarre family reunions.)

Anyway, I play the piano for our congregation's worship team, which practices early Sunday morning. After practice, we always gather for prayer, and that moment involves forming a circle connected by our linked hands.

This year, however, is the worst flu season in decades. People are dropping like aching, fevered flies, and they are DYING from this flu.

Just to reiterate, this flu is KILLING PEOPLE, INCLUDING CHILDREN. AND OTHER PEOPLE.

And 80% of flu, cold, and diarrheal germs are passed by hand-to-hand contact. 

Ahem. Anyway, when the moment came for us to join hands for prayer, I suggested that perhaps The Almighty would appreciate us keeping our hands and our germiness to ourselves in the interest of not KILLING THE PEOPLE CREATED BY THE CREATOR. "After all," I pointed out, "80 percent of flu germs are passed by hand-to-hand-contact."

People, the rest of the worship team laughed. So I stood outside of the circle, hands folded during the prayer, with my own personal petition being a silent plea for attitude adjustment. This plea was not completely successful, as I could not resist pointing out that our congregation also is putting into place a security plan because there was a church shooting in Texas. And that while this is a sad and necessary step, we are much more likely to kill each other with our dadgummed hand-holding and WHAT ARE WE DOING ABOUT THAT?

So. I do what I can, wash-wash-wash-lotion-lotion-lotion-sanitizer-sanitizer-sanitizer and I continue to love the ones who pooh-pooh the Liberian Elbow Bump.

I'm definitely going to be getting the flu.