Dust to Dust

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© 2001-2002 R.C. Barajas

ust is the weirdest thing.

Even the word is weird if you look at it too long. Truncated and dry, like a cough.

I've heard it's largely made up of the dead skin cells we slough off. As if thinking of it as just dirt wasn't appetizing enough.

I'm ruminating on dust right now because these last few days I've been trying to eradicate it from my house. In preparation for a party we're having on Saturday. Somewhere it is written than one is supposed to dust before having guests over. And vacuum and wash and oil and scrub and disinfect.

Then we are supposed to pretend that we live like this all the time.

Strange, I think, as I wipe over a lampshade, that having a party can shame me into doing what my son's asthma cannot.

His wheezing used to get pretty bad, and he'd crawl for his inhaler, pumping it into his lungs to open up the tiny bronchioles the dust had infiltrated. I used to wish I could do something to help him. Something besides dusting, I mean.

I'm supposed to be on top of the whole dust thing because it is one of his strongest triggers. His pediatrician, a gullible but otherwise brilliant woman, believes me to be the kind of reliable asthmatic's mother with whom she can collaborate in order to effectively treat his chronic disease. She believes I dust and vacuum his room daily and that I wash the mattress and pillow casings weekly in hot water to kill the nasty dust mites whose excreta causes his histamine to go haywire. She believes I long ago threw away all his stuffed animals -- the furry ones that are built-in dust magnets. She believes I love my child enough to do these things. It isn't that I don't love him enough to take these steps -- not exactly. Yes, I dust, vacuum, and wash. It's just the "daily" and "weekly" pieces I tend to dismiss as "overkill". Leaving aside the minor inconvenience of his not being able to breathe, I know he will love me despite the dust.

Can the same claim be made of my guests? Would dust preclude their affection? Doubt urges me on, and I stab the duster through the gaps in the stair rails and swipe it over the molding.

I remind myself that my son's asthma is much improved. I like to think that had I followed doctor's orders and battled with the dust each day, he never would have "toughened up". I imagine cloudy little Pig-Pen antibodies coursing through his veins. "Mother does know best," I mutter, breathing a deep sigh of relief -- and coughing delicately in the billowing dust cloud from the sofa I am vacuuming.

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