Coming Clean

Before coming to the meal, one question always comes up. 

To "come clean" is another way of saying to "fess up," or to tell all. Coming clean is a way of taking ownership or responsibility for one's misdeeds.

One hopes that there are not too many times when it is necessary to "come clean." Why live in such a way in which you're always having to fess up?

But when many of us were kids, "coming clean" was a common occurrence. A version of it happened just before arriving at the supper table: "Did you wash your hands?" mom asked. As kids, many of us heard that question all the time. It detoured us to the sink, on our way to dinner. We were, in a real sense, "coming clean."

It's an even more important question today, living, as we do, in this overcrowded, disease-ridden world. Public health experts are forever teaching that one of the best disease-prevention techniques is also the simplest: the very one mom insisted on. Good old soap and water does the trick, as long as we devote proper time and attention to the task.

One old guideline suggests we...