Death by a thousand bites (or just one bite in a really bad place)

Summertime and the living is easy, as long as you follow one simple rule: whether you're working, shopping, picknicking, or mowing the lawn, try not to think about the mosquito bite in your armpit.

I know it's hot! I know the air's so thick with humidity that you could part it like a curtain, and every tiny movement causes sweat to pour out directly over that mosquito bite and make it feel as if your entire armpit is on fire, but whatever you do, don't think about it. In particular, don't think about scratching it. In public. Like, at the grocery store.

Say you're pushing your shopping cart around the store, enjoying the refreshing air conditioning before you have to plunge back into the outdoor sauna holding the entire midwest in its crushing grip right now, when suddenly that mosquito bite starts to itch and sting like an entire Fourth of July fireworks display under your arm. What should you do?  

Don't scratch. Don't even think about scratching, not just because scratching one's armpit in public Simply Isn't Done but because you'll eventually have to hand your money over to the cashier with a hand that smells like sweaty armpit, and if you happen to be walking up the seasonal items aisle and notice a set of grilling tools on sale, do not even think about grabbing that pointy meat fork and using it to scratch your armpit until it's raw and bloody, because then they'd make you buy the bloody meat fork and how will you ever show your face in that store again?

If you must think about the mosquito bite under your armpit, you might wonder how a mosquito managed to sting you in that relatively inaccessible spot. I mean, what were you doing, wandering through the woods waving your arms in the air? You couldn't have been signaling for a touchdown during baseball season, so maybe that pesky mosquito targeted your armpit at the precise moment when you were reaching up to refill the hummingbird feeder. Lucky little mosquito. Hope it enjoyed that blood meal because someone ought to get some pleasure out of this experience and that someone certainly isn't you.

Especially don't think about the mosquito bite in your armpit while you're lying in bed trying to get to sleep at night despite the feeling that millions of creepy-crawlies are continuously feeding on your armpit. You're alone in the dark; no one would ever know if you just reached over and started scratching until you found some relief, but let's face it: there will be no relief, not even if you scratch it bloody, and then every ounce of sweat you excrete will make it sting even more and it may even get badly infected, and who wants to deal with an infected armpit? You think a mosquito bite is bad! Imagine asking your beloved doctor to look at the massive oozing pulsing glob of pus colonizing your armpit. So don't scratch. No good can come of it. Sit on your hands if you have to.

Don't even think about it. Think of anything else besides the mosquito bite in your armpit, even though there's a mosquito bite in your armpit and it's never, ever going to stop itching until you break down and grab a sharp metal implement like a paring knife or a meat fork or your car keys or even a bouquet of long-stemmed roses at a booth at the Farmers' Market. Do not--repeat NOT--grab the bouquet by the blossoms and start tearing at your skin with the thorny stems until the blood pours down your arms and they find you laughing and bleeding on the sidewalk in the middle of town and call for reinforcements. "Put down your weapon," they'll say, but you'll be so engrossed in the sweet relief of scratching that you'll threaten anyone who comes near you with the thorny stems, and the next thing you know you'll be shot dead on the sidewalk and someone will have to peel those stems out of your cold, dead hands.

But look on the bright side: at least you won't have to think about the mosquito bite in your armpit.