The boys are back in town.
The fabulous Mikey and the amazing Jack have returned with their handlers to Maryland to live. You can tell by the toys, equipment and toddler foods that arrived with them and now fill my empty nest.
But you can also tell by looking at me. In my bathrobe, under a comforter on the couch, clutching a box of tissues, coughing up a lung.
I am sick, and I think I know whom to blame.
This happens every time I am around my grandsons for more than FaceTime on my iPhone. I get a cold.
When their father and his sister were little, I used to say ruefully that children bring home some fresh nastiness from pre-school, wear you down taking care of them, and then infect your defenseless self with some spare germs in an attempt at an early inheritance.
So this is all pretty familiar.
I asked my physician — we see a lot of each other these days — why I was so vulnerable to their germs considering the number of people I interact with each day, and she explained it this way.
I do indeed have the antibodies I need to fight off this kid stuff. But they are stored in an unmarked crate at the back of the cavernous warehouse where the U.S. government is keeping the Ark of the Covenant that Indiana Jones rescued. There is no chance I will find them in time to battle back the next wave of infection.
The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases reports that in families with children in school, the number of colds can be as high as 12 per child per year. But the NIAID also reports that people older than 60 on average have less than one cold a year. Put those kids with those grandparents and, well, you do the math.
Children can be absolutely irresistible — it is part of their plan to seduce you into caring for them until they can live independently — and none more so than your own grandchildren. But that pricelessness comes with a price.
We don't get to retreat to bed with a cold while someone else cares for us until it passes. That's the province of children.
There are some steps grandparents can take to stay healthy around the grandkids, according to the website Grandparents.com. Most are common sense, but there are a couple I hadn't thought of.
Mikey knows how to cough into his elbow, not into his hands. Get your grandchild to teach you this technique for keeping hands a little less germy.
Germs can live on a door knob, hand rail or other surface for at least three hours, so scrub your hands often. But remember, it isn't the soap so much as the scrubbing motion that beats back germs.
Germs live on your face, too. So scrub it when you scrub your hands.
When cradling a sick child, consider wearing a bathrobe or house coat and removing it when you put the child down for a rest.
Create a makeshift bed or cozy place where a toddler can rest and play near you — without spending that time in your lap.
Give a child older than two his own box of tissues and his own wastebasket and put him in charge of his own nose. Perhaps you can teach him how to put a little dab of petroleum jelly at the bottom of that sore nose, saving you exposure.
Most cold germs can be traced to the kitchen where even hot soapy water cannot kill off the bacteria in dish cloths and sponges. Instead, wet them and microwave them for two minutes.
And for heaven's sake, don't share silverware or cups no matter how much the baby wants to feed Grandma some of his treat.
Finally — I am sure you remember this part from when you were the parent — rest, fluids and time cure even the most stubborn colds. In kids and grandparents alike.
Susan Reimer's column appears on Mondays and Thursdays. She can be reached at sreimer@baltsun.com and @SusanReimer on Twitter.com.