LOOKING FOR BLISS AMONG THE UNHEALTHY PERILS OF EVERYDAY LIVING

Ignorance is bliss, the saying goes. It's not necessarily healthy or safe or responsible, but not knowing certain facts can keep troubles out of mind if not out of your life. You read about high school massacres and the bombing of buildings, and you start seeing bad guys lurking around every corner and explosive devices in every moving truck.

As I was covering a Veterans Day ceremony at Capaha Park, a rental moving truck drove through the parking lot. I watched it warily as it circled the lot and was relieved when it drove on. I couldn't help but think about all I'd read and seen about that yellow Ryder truck and the Oklahoma City bombing. Without such knowledge, I would never have paid that truck any mind. And I would be a lot more relaxed if I didn't know there are germs everywhere all kinds of germs, hidden in all kinds of nasty places that do all kinds of horrible things to your body.

Much of what I've learned of germs lately has come from Sue Tippon, a communicable disease specialist with the Missouri Department of Health. Every time I talk to that woman, I go give my hands a good washing because she makes me realize how many diseases are trying to sneak up on me. The germs hide on doorknobs, telephone receivers, people's hands and, perhaps most menacing of all, the bathroom.

For a story on a recent outbreak of hepatitis A in Bollinger Country, Tippon informed me that hepatitis A is spread through the fecal-oral route. Believe me when I say, I was happier not knowing that this disease is usually spread when you put something in your mouth that has been contaminated with the stool of a person who has the disease. Yuck.

Not only did I immediately go wash my hands after learning this, I had a hard time getting out of the bathroom because I didn't want to touch the door handle in case the last person out that door didn't do a good job of hand-washing.

Some experiences are just ruined when you know too much. I used to enjoy swimming in lakes and streams. Many youthful days were spent cooling off on hot afternoons by splashing in a swimming hole.

Then I started reading about pesticide runoff and the dumping of untreated sewage. About improper disposal of wastes and runoff of feces from dairy and pig farms.

How many particulates of excrement constitute a safe level? I'd say zero, but I know that's too much to ask. Instead I just dip my pinkies into water I once would have submerged myself in. I implore my children not to get water in their mouths and, for heaven's sake, don't swallow any of it.

Of course, the knowledge of such things can help protect us. A U.S. post office policy that packages over a pound can't be mailed in drop boxes was instituted to deter people from mailing packaged bombs. If the policy protects even one person, isn't it worth the extra trouble it takes to go inside the post office to mail that package.

If everyone would scrub their hands thoroughly after using the bathroom, keep their immunizations up to date and stay home when they are contagious, we'd probably have a lot fewer cases of sickness.

Still I'd love to go back to a time when I could splash in a lake without worrying about what invisible items were in there splashing with me.

Teresa Johnson is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.