Sand in the teeth
We’ve been at the Jersey shore the last few days. Today, Daniel was lying on the beach with his head on his arm, vaguely dragging a finger around in the sand. When I looked a bit closer, however, it was clear that he was also sticking out his tongue, gathering just a bit of sand on the tip and then eating it. This is a boy who won’t eat any fruit but kiwis, any vegetable but carrots, no pizza, no cake and only recently consented to try ice cream, but sand? Sand, he’ll eat. Please don’t eat sand, said I, trying to think what might happen to a digestive system filled with sand. Would the sand simply pass on through or would it act like a cleansing agent, scouring out the various tracts as it goes? Or would it sit in the bottom of the stomach for ever and ever? A bit later on, Helena began licking the sand off her sippy cup. Helena, please don’t eat sand, I said. As I watched both children ingesting sand and apparently enjoying it, I intermittently pleaded with them to stop and wondered if this were a symptom of something seriously wrong in my offspring, like some rare tropical illness or incipient psychosis. Suddenly, Helena stuck her fingers in my mouth. (This happens unfortunately frequently.)
Tiny bits of filthy Jersey shore tumbled around my mouth and a visceral memory of childhood culinary experiments in the sandbox washed over me. I did eat sand. A lot. I relaxed somewhat and watched them munch.
