So, here’s the situation. There’s this woman that I know. Her son and Co were in the same pre-school class last year. She also is a regular at the YMCA and we use the same babysitter. Let’s call this woman “Sue”.

Sue and I aren’t friends in the traditional sense, but we are certainly acquaintances. She always speaks, inquiring after the girls and our week-end plans. We engage in the usual mom banter that occurs during those quick minutes of pre-school drop-off and pick-up. At the Y, we may have our step benches near one another and catch up before the multiple glute lifts and three-knee repeaters rob us of our ability to talk. She’s a very nice person, and while either one of us may offer up a, “We should grab coffee one morning,” I think we both know that it’s an illusory invite, and not a real one.

So anyway, I was at the Y the other day for this step aerobics class and I saw Sue there. On my way into the step room, Sue was on her way out, her large red and blue handbag slung over her shoulder. She tossed off a “Be right back,” in my direction as I went in. I dropped my gear, set up my bench and decided that my morning two glasses of water and cup of coffee had caught up with me. A bathroom break was in order.

The closest bathroom near the step room has only two stalls in it, one of which was occupied when I entered. I see a red and blue handbag peeking out from under the door of the the

occupied stall.

Now, I have always been a conversationalist, but in public bathrooms, I just don’t see the need to strike up a dialogue. You handle your business, I’ll handle mine and you can tell me all about the season finale of DWTS when we come out.

The person in the stall next to me flushes, picks up her bag, steps out of the stall and leaves. She left the bathroom. Without washing her hands. Didn’t even turn the faucet and pass her fingertips under the water. I say “she” and “her”, but we all know who it was!

In this day and age of H1n1, Avian flu, and who knows what else, you have GOT to wash your hands. Sure, there is now a Purell dispenser in just about every major retailer, children’s play area, and so on, but hand washing is key. So I wash my hands – with soap, of course and use my elbow to depress the paper towel lever. I then use that same paper towel to open the door to the bathroom because Little Miss Pee-Pee Hands just touched it.

Back in the step room, turns out Sue is about a bench behind me, her red and blue handbag holding her place. Sue comes over and starts talking about how tough the last step class we shared had been. She and I aren’t the type of acquaintances where either one of us would put a hand on the other’s shoulder or arm to emphasize a point, but she does gesture with her hands while she talks. So, of course, I can’t take my eyes off of her hands. All I could think was that little microbes were shouting “Bonzai!!” as they parachuted off her hands and onto the various surfaces in the vicinity — like my skin.

I’m hoping that I don’t have another experience like that. I’m pretty non-confrontational and I’m not very smooth, so getting in her face about not washing or hands or pulling out my own Purell and offering her some were never options. I am curious, however, what you would have done in that situation. Put yourself in my work-out shoes and let me know.