Breathing Right

Every night before bed, I don a Breathe-Right strip. These adhesive plastic pieces are also described by my alphabet-obsessed son as I's, as in "Daddy, you have an 'I' on your nose." These brilliant inventions are designed to open your nasal passages by sticking to the skin on one's nose while simultaneously working to return to it's steady-state two-dimensional flatness. This results in an unnatural stretching of the personal breathing apparatus. While the physics of this interaction are enough to throw one's nighttime chi out of alignment, it works wonders for the sleeping nose.

I'm sure that you have seen the commercials. My favorite advertisement is the one in which the inventor of these midnight miracles discusses the history of the strips. He shows earlier attempts at nasal aperture enlargement, including a tubular-shaped implement of torture that looks like a piece of the Ted Williams Tunnel. Designed to go inside the nostrils, the side effects surely must have included unexpected glimpses of the brain by anyone standing within a few feet.

This product is sold in two sizes: Small/Medium and Large. Technically, that's three sizes but apparently the small noses simply need to adapt. However, I learned that this is not easily done when I accidentally purchased the Large strips. If they were any larger, I would have started hearing better too.

The product is also sold in two colors: Clear and Tan. The tan strips are skin-colored so that one isn't too embarrassed when they happen to run into someone while they're sleeping. The clear ones are made from different materials and designed for sensitive skin. I once made the wrong decision with regards to color too. I balked at the idea that I had sensitive skin, until I nearly ripped my nose off of my face with the tan ones. After a few days, I was checking the adhesive side for parts of me. Although my search and rescue efforts always came up empty, my nose was starting to bleed a little. It was time to donate the tan ones to someone with leather skin and purchase the clear ones.

There are a couple possible reasons for why I need these devices to sleep better. I will now frustrate at least half of my readers by explaining that the first reason is unknown. In fact, I can only speculate that I may have been born with a deviated septum or smaller-than-average nostrils. Growing up as a child, I was a mouth breather. My parents and teachers would ask me to close my mouth and breathe through my nose so as not to catch flies. While this sounded like a perfectly great idea to anyone listening, I simply could not do it without feeling like I was slowly suffocating. Therefore, I breathed with my mouth open and perfected my bug dodging skills.

There is another possible reason, one that I am not proud of, for why Breathe-Right strips make their way to my shopping cart each week. I have always enjoyed making people laugh and until recently, I could not do this with words alone. Therefore, a few neighborhood kids could barely contain their laughter when I proved to them that I could make myself sneeze by hitting myself squarely and forcefully on the bridge of the nose. Unfortunately this performance, along with telling classmates that colored paper had flavor, did not make me more popular or smarter. In fact, I'm sure that a sore nose and a belly full of rainbow-colored construction paper did exactly the opposite.

But for the purpose of keeping my reputation as an intellectual, we will agree that I was born with a physical limitation that requires me to implement the 'I'. Now, there are few things that bother my wife more than the following statement spoken early one recent morning: "I lost the Breathe-Right strip." I'm not sure if she's worried about the adhesive or what the adhesive took with it, but she feels that it's a personal hygiene item that should be properly inventoried at all times. To be honest, I was also concerned that the strip had disappeared without warning. I looked on the pillow, under the pillow, on the sheets, under the sheets, on the floor, under the bed, on the wall, on the end table, on the wall again, and on the alarm clock. The strip was nowhere to be found. I ran to the mirror to confirm that the strip had not attached itself to some other part of my face or upper body. Check.

A couple days passed, and even with the help of a 3 year old alphabet detective and a very determined spouse, we were unable to find the strip until this morning. While in the produce section at the grocery store, I sensed my foot sticking to my sandal. Unable to ignore it, I leaned against the apple display and reached into my shoe to discover the strip stuck to the bottom of my foot. With fingers pinching it tightly, so as not to let it escape again, I walked briskly to the men's room where I promptly flushed it goodbye.

After washing my hands, I returned to shopping in the vegetable section. A few moments later, it occurred to me that perhaps the strip was not mine after all. Although this was a disgusting thought, I dismissed it and called my wife.

"I found the strip," I said.

"So did I," she replied.