by Marie Moeller ’15
Journalism Student

I learned: Girls do have cooties.

Hello my fellow citizens of the planet Earth! It was only about a week ago when we ran into a Boy Scout troop selling some (very delicious) popcorn out in front of Shoppers. Naturally, we bought some popcorn, but I am not here to tell you how delicious the popcorn was (which is very delicious). Rather, the reason that I am writing this to you is because of a childhood memory that resurfaced upon seeing the troop. So, without further ado, I hope you all will enjoy my story!

“Circle, circle. Dot, dot—

Now you’ve got the cootie shot!”

Oh, the days of my youth. The days where little girls chased around little boys giving them the infectious social disease, known no other than by the name of: cooties. Now, I’m pretty sure that I didn’t even know exactly what the cooties were back then. I just knew that I definitely did not have them, which I never knew until a little while ago, how true that statement actually was.

My story begins in front of Giant Food Warehouse with my Girl Scout troop. We were selling Girl Scout cookies and one man walks out of the store and asked us if girls really had cooties. Of course, we skeptically told him that we in fact did not. The man just shrugged his shoulders and donated money the money to the troops that our funds were going to. It was a nice childhood memory, but it didn’t come up again until last year when we had to look up the definition of the word “cootie” in relation to the novel we were reading (To Kill a Mockingbird). Now, I was absolutely flabbergasted when I found out that the term “cootie” was a term used for head lice. It was almost ironic too that our childhood play consisted of the boys staying away from the girls. In its own sense, it was an accurate reproduction of children staying away from the “infected” girl, who was more commonly to have the lice because of her long hair.

It also brings to mind other forms of childhood play that potentially unravel in the same way. For instance, “Ring around the Rosie” was supposedly intended to describe the bubonic plague. It is fascinating while at the same time a teensy bit disturbing that children are singing and conducting child play to such urban legends and folklore. However, to children this is merely another harmless part of their everyday lives. I feel that there is nothing wrong with children learning the history of the world and the morals to life at a young age through nursery rhymes. It certainly doesn’t hurt anyone. (Well, maybe a little bit. Falling down on a hard surface can really hurt.) From my own experiences it was fascinating to learn the tales behind our childhood play and how these meanings from long ago have been embedded in our lives. Maybe, it’s just me who thinks this, but at least I know now that I have never definitely been in contact with the contagious cooties.