The author’s mother (left) and Aunt Alice (right), 1996. Photo courtesy of the author.When I was in grade school, my mother bought me a sweatshirt that read: “Dirty air makes you pick your nose!” On the front were many different people and some animals (I specifically remember a crow) in a cloud of gray pollution, all picking their noses (the crow picked its beak with its wing). She thought it was funny. She probably said it “tickled” her. Maybe because of that, I instinctively felt...
