For anyone who assumed it was just sleep: there's an explanation.

It never occurred to me that it was a symptom of anything. That's why I never mentioned it. You don't bring up sleep gunk at an appointment.

The washcloth comes first. I look after, if I look at all. Nobody ever told me whether that order matters. I had one category for it. Sleep. I used that category for years.

One morning of not wiping is a small ask. What you see in the corner is the only evidence you've been throwing away. I'm not going to tell you it means a disease. I am going to say I had never been invited to treat it as information.

After fifty, everything gets blamed on sleep. Some of it is sleep. I'm not sure this is.

I never mentioned it because it never occurred to me that it was a symptom of anything. That's a wide door. It's also why this page is easy to close. You can decide it's nothing and be right. You can also look once.

There's no drama in a washcloth. That's why I almost didn't write this. The film is either nothing or it's the only daily evidence you have. Both can be true for different people. The only mistake is never giving it a second thought long enough to ask.

I'm not going to tell you the color means a disease. Other pages do that. I wiped first for years. The morning I looked first was the morning the habit became a question.

Here is what had already failed, in the order I tried them:

• Nothing, because it never seemed like a problem
• A warm compress for what I assumed was dryness
• Wiping before looking, for years
• Never mentioning it, because it seemed like sleep

There is no failed purchase here. There is only a habit that never got a second look.

Is the film only sleep, or is it trying to say something?

Figure · the barrier

The explanation that gave the film a second thought is a wall around the back of the eye, and something from the gut that may not stay on its side. That is a question you can take to an appointment.

What people do with the question is one capsule a day, with food. I wanted the looking to come before the cloth, once, and then a next step that was more than another guess.

If you wipe first every morning, try it for sixty days and see.