I found a tiny white stick in my son’s room and was too embarrassed to ask him about it. Does anyone know what it is?

or labels—just a smooth plastic casing, a cap on the bottom, and tiny perforated holes at the top.

I turned it over in my hand, puzzled. Could it be a school gadget? A tiny electronic gadget? A makeup tool? Or something else entirely that I didn’t want to know about? The longer I held it, the wilder my imagination ran.

I almost asked him directly. But a teenager’s question, “What is this?”, can lead to awkward situations I didn’t want to explore. Instead, I did what many cautious parents would