How Touchland Became a Tween Sacrament
A tween fashion trend, a classroom controversy, and a glimpse into our sanitized souls.
This post is a playful detour from my ongoing “Grace Between the Lines” series. See it as a chance to stretch out, laugh a little, and maybe see the sacred hiding in something as absurdly trendy as scented hand sanitizer.
There’s a new object of desire among the 5th grade faithful.
No, not Pokémon cards. Not squishy keychains. Not even a retro Tamagotchi.
It’s...
Hand sanitizer.
Specifically: Touchland.
A sleek, minimalist rectangle clipped to your backpack like a holy relic. They come in flavors like Velvet Peach, Power Mist Blue Sandalwood, and Frosted Mint. They're the Birkin bag of the tween hygiene set. Kids trade them, collect them, compare them.
And they’re not just cleaning hands. They’re flexing. It’s a soft, citrusy power move. Like, if you misted with Velvet Peach before math class, it basically meant you understood the assignment: fashion, fragrance, and fourth-period social capital.
In the era of the COVID kids, purity has gone mainstream in literal, visible, spray-it-on-your-palms purity. And it’s got me thinking...
A Shift in What’s “Cool”
When I was that age, the coolest kid wasn’t the one with the chicest germ shield. It was the one who lit a Marlboro behind the gym. Maybe got into a fight. Quoted Bart Simpson on the regular. Probably had dirt under their fingernails and wore a Megadeth t-shirt.
But now? Kids don’t fight. They don’t sneak cigarettes. They don’t even talk back all that much. (Thanks be to God.)
Instead, they sanitize. They spritz before snack. After snack. During snack. Like it's a nervous tic—or a soothing ritual that smells faintly of grapefruit.
Cool hasn’t disappeared. It’s just done a 180. It’s gone from edgy and dangerous to hyper-sanitized and socially acceptable. The pendulum hasn’t just swung, it’s done a full pirouette in a cloud of Power Mist. Cool used to be about taking risks; now it’s about not offending anyone, looking good doing it, and smelling like you respect public health.
A Curious Observation
Let’s be honest. I don’t think 11-year-olds are equating Touchland with spiritual enlightenment. They’re not misting their hands thinking, “Ah yes, now I am one with the Divine.” They think it looks cool. It smells nice. It probably showed up in an influencer’s “back-to-school essentials” haul, and now here we are.
But isn’t it a little funny that the cultural icon of coolness among tweens right now is... hand sanitizer?
This isn’t Beavis & Butthead rebellion. This isn’t “I pierced my ear with a safety pin in the bathroom at Hot Topic” cool. This is socially acceptable, parent-approved, aesthetically pleasing cool. No one can be offended by hand sanitizer. Hand sanitizer isn’t 'problematic.' It won’t get you suspended. It’s spiffy. It’s citrus-scented compliance.
Honestly, it’s the perfect idol for the moment: clean, expensive, inoffensive.
Although, ironically, Rory’s teacher sent out an email asking parents to please stop sending Touchland to school. Apparently, the kids were spritzing themselves into an ever-present fog of fragrance. She politely requested they stick to the jumbo bottle of unscented Purell on the back counter like God and the school district intended.
So maybe the revolution isn’t dead after all. Maybe it just smells like watermelon mist now. It’s less about overthrowing the system and more about lightly annoying your teacher with excessive fragrance. Still, it’s something. A little puff of playful rebellion in an otherwise hyper-compliant world.
But it does remind me of ancient purity rites. The kind Jesus railed against.
The kind where the outside of the cup is spotless.
Where edges are smoothed, smells are masked, and discomfort is scrubbed away with a hint of lavender and glycerin.
Because Jesus didn’t come for the sanitized.
He touched the leper.
He let a bleeding woman grab his hem.
He dined with the unwashed and uninvited. And probably didn’t use a coaster.
His wasn’t a ministry of sanitization. It was one of spit, dirt, and fire.
It was the collision of holiness and human mess.
What I Hope for This Generation
Let me be clear: I’m a fan of these kids. They’re thoughtful. They’re empathetic. They’re weirdly good at Google Slides. And I genuinely think they’re going to save us from some of the digital dumpster fires we’ve created.
But I also want them to feel free to mess up a little. To forget their homework. To get muddy. To fall off their bike while trying something dumb and glorious. Not everything has to be clean, curated, and parent-approved. There’s something sacred about the awkward, the unscripted, the real.
Sometimes, the holiest thing you can do is make a mistake and learn to laugh about it later.
The Real Sacrament
Look, I’m not saying Touchland is evil. Use it. Love it. Stock up at Ulta.
But maybe a life of grace looks more like compost than glass cleaner.
Maybe our kids (and we) need permission to be a little messy.
Touchland may be a status symbol. But it’s not a sacrament.
That belongs to something far less sterile:
Bread. Wine. Flesh. Blood. Community. Forgiveness.
And yes, grace that sticks to you like dirt under your nails.
Not because you’re spiritually broken, but because you’re delightfully, irrevocably human.
Because real love leaves smudges. And that’s a good thing.